Pages Mill, Tennessee
                                                                              submitted by Janie Putman   
                                                          December 1, 1998 

    During the period from 1824 to 1830 most of the families, in the south side of district 8 in Gibson County, lived near what is today called the Riverside and Hooten area. In the beginning, this was called Pages Mill.  A post office was located at Pages Mill from November 17, 1828 until October 24, 1831 with John Page serving as Postmaster.  This was located a short distance east of where the old Forked Deer River Bridge was and at the location where Stanley Creek entered the Forked Deer River (the old Forked Deer River before it was dredged out).

     The Tennessee State Legislature passed an act on November 4, 1825, declaring the north fork of the Forked Deer River navigable.   Pages Mill Community first developed near the river because of its importance in travel and in shipping supplies into and products out of the area.  It also furnished the source of power for the mill which was a food supply.  Roads were mostly trails at that time and they became one of the first priorities for people in the community.   At the April 1825 term of the Gibson County Court much time was spent on roads leading in different directions.  One statement recorded was:  "The report of the Jury of view appointed by the court at its last term to run and mark out a road from Port Gibson (later Trenton) to the Dyer Co. line in a direction to Dyersburg was rejected by the court."    Later in the same session we find:  "Ordered by the Court that George Claiboun, William Alford, John Howard, William McKindrick, James Blakeman, John Page and James M. Lewis be appointed a Jury of view to run and mark out a road from Port Gibson to the Dyer County line by way of Pages Mill.  The jury shall be required to pay due respect to the county through which this road may run."

     Just six years later, our state legislative records shows a Turnpike being built through our community.

County Court Records, 1824 and Land Records referring to Pages Mill and the Mill Pond at the mouth of Stanley Creek on the Forked Deer River.

Tennessee Post offices and Postmasters Appointments, 1789-1984, Compiled by: D. R. Frazier, Dover, Tennessee, 1984.

Minutes, Gibson County Court, April, 1825.

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