Marion County, Tennessee

Marion County Education, Geography, and History

Marion County is a county located in the state of Tennessee. Based on the 2010 census, the population was 28,237. Its county seat is Jasper.

Marion County is part of the Chattanooga, TN–GA Metropolitan Statistical Area

Etymology - Origin of Marion County Name

Named in honor of Francis Marion (1732-1795), continental and Revolutionary War officer whose guerilla tactics in the Revolutionary War won him the title "Swamp Fox."

Demographics:

County QuickFacts: CensusBureau Quick Facts

History of Marion County

Created 1817 from Indian lands; named in honor of Francis Marion (1732-1795), continental and Revolutionary War officer whose guerilla tactics in the Revolutionary War won him the title "Swamp Fox."

Marion County was formed in 1817 from Indian lands
(Acts of Tennessee 1817, Chapter 109).

There was a fire at the Marion County courthouse in 1922.

Tennessee Encyclopedia of History and Culture
Marion County, located in the southern part of the Cumberland Plateau and the Sequatchie Valley, encompasses five hundred square miles. Established in 1817 out of Cherokee lands, the county was named for General Francis Marion, a Revolutionary War leader in South Carolina. When Tennessee became a state, the Sequatchie Valley was a part of Roane County. The upper end of the valley was established as Bledsoe County in 1807. This county included all of the valley, but treaties with the Cherokees kept white settlers out of the lower end. The first white settlers are thought to have been Amos Griffith and William and James Standifer in 1805, while the area was still part of Roane County.

Native Americans have played an important part in the history of present-day Marion County. They built their towns on the rivers and were living here when the white men came. These newcomers kept the Indian names Tennessee and Sequatchie for this area. Recent research indicates that in 1560 Spanish soldiers from Tristan de Luna's expedition entered the Tennessee River valley in the vicinity of Marion County, visiting the main town of the chiefdom of Napochies. More than a century later, the next Europeans to make contact with the Native Americans found a number of tribes in what later became Tennessee. The Cherokee dominated this area later in the 1700s and early 1800s. Find more from the Tennessee Encyclopedia of History and Culture: MARION COUNTY

Geography

As reported by the Census Bureau, the county has a total area of 512 square miles (1,327 km²), of which, 498 square miles (1,291 km²) of it is land and 14 square miles (36 km²) of it (2.72%) is water.
 

Neighboring Counties

Bordering counties are as follows:

• Grundy County (north)
• Sequatchie County (northeast)
• Hamilton County (east)
• Dade County, Georgia (southeast)
• Jackson County, Alabama (southwest)
• Franklin County (west)
  

Education

Jasper Elementary School
Jasper Middle School
Marion county High School
Monteagle Elementary School
South Pittsburg Elementary
South Pittsburg High School
Whitwell Elementary School
Whitwell Middle School
Whitwell High School

Compare More Colleges and Universities

Find more schools to match to your needs.

Start Now