Cameron's 1890 Courthouse Is on the National Register

Cameron was laid out in 1846 on a 60-acre tract along the Little River. It was named for Ewen Cameron, a soldier from the Texas Revolution. The town was the county seat from the start but grew slowly because no railroad reached it until 1881. When the Gulf, Colorado and Santa Fe Railway arrived, the population grew from about 500 to around 2,000 over the following years.

The courthouse built in 1890 still stands and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Cotton farming drove the local economy through the 19th and early 20th centuries. Oil was discovered in the area in 1921. An Alcoa aluminum plant near Rockdale, established in the 1950s, brought manufacturing jobs to the county. Cameron today has a population of roughly 5,300.