Craft Put Cherokee County's Tomato Crop on the Railroad

Craft sits two miles south of Jacksonville on U.S. 69, small enough now that its old story is easy to miss. The community was earlier called Independence. Its post office took the name Craft in 1891 for postmaster Thomas J. Craft, and the railroad between Rusk and Jacksonville gave the place room to grow.

Commercial tomato growing began around Craft in 1896. A carload left by rail on June 14, 1897, and the trade gathered speed. By 1917, the area was shipping 90 percent of the tomatoes produced in Texas. Craft's high point included a depot, a church, a three-teacher school, two stores, and two tomato-packing sheds. The depot tied nearby farms to buyers beyond the county.

That is the working ground beneath Jacksonville's tomato identity. It grew from fields, crates, packing sheds, and a train schedule tight enough to move a perishable crop. A state marker beside U.S. 69 now keeps Craft's part of that story in view. This little community is where tomatoes had to reach the track on time.