Huntsville, Texas

Huntsville is a city in and the county seat of Walker County, Texas, United States. Its population was 45,941 as of the 2020 census. It is the center of the Huntsville micropolitan area. Huntsville is in the East Texas Piney Woods on Interstate 45 and home to Sam Houston State University, Texas State Prison, the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, Huntsville State Park, and HEARTS Veterans Museum of Texas.

The city served as the residence of Sam Houston, the first and third president of the Republic of Texas, who later represented the state in the U.S. Senate. He is recognized in Huntsville by the Sam Houston Memorial Museum, a statue on Interstate 45, and Sam Houston State University, located in central Huntsville.

The city got its beginning circa 1836, when Pleasant and Ephraim Gray opened a trading post on the site. Ephraim Gray became first postmaster in 1837, naming it after his hometown of Huntsville, Alabama.

The hill at 7th Street and University Avenue, known as Cotton Gin Hill, was the site of several gins and became the ginning and shipping center.

Huntsville became the home of Sam Houston, who served as president of the Republic of Texas, Governor of the State of Texas, governor of Tennessee, U.S. senator, and Tennessee congressman. Houston led the Texas Army in the Battle of San Jacinto, the decisive victory of the Texas Revolution. He has been noted for his life among the Cherokees of Tennessee, and— near the end of his life — for his opposition to the Civil War, a very unpopular position in his day. Huntsville has two of Houston's homes, his grave, and the Sam Houston Memorial Museum. Houston's life in Huntsville is also commemorated by his namesake Sam Houston State University founded in 1879, and by a 70 ft (21 m) statue. (The towering statue, A Tribute to Courage by artist David Adickes, has been described as the world's largest statue of an American hero, and is easily viewed by travelers on Interstate 45.)

Bishop Ward Normal and Collegiate Institute opened in September of 1883 in Huntsville. It was the 5th college of African Americans in the state of Texas. Huntsville was also the home of Samuel Walker Houston (1864–1945), a prominent African-American pioneer in the field of education. He was born into slavery on February 12, 1864, to Joshua Houston, an African American enslaved by Sam Houston. Samuel W. Houston founded the Galilee Community School in 1907, which later became known as the Houstonian Normal and Industrial Institute, in Walker County.

In 1995, on the grounds of the old Samuel W. Houston Elementary School, the Huntsville Independent School District, along with the Huntsville Arts Commission and the high school's Ex-Students Association, commissioned the creation of The Dreamers, a monument to underscore the black community's contributions to the growth and development of Huntsville and Walker County.

After a book display at the Huntsville Public Library generated a controversy among city officials in 2022, the library removed two book displays. Following the removal of the book displays, the city decided to privatize the library.