Franklin County, Arkansas: History
Franklin County was carved out of Crawford County in December 1837. At that time, Franklin was significantly larger than it is at present, encompassing part of present-day Logan County which was formed in 1871.
Initially, the county had a single courthouse at Ozark. To promote economic growth in the county, federal land grants were made in 1853 to incentivize the construction and operation of the Little Rock and Fort Smith Railroad. From receivership in 1875 after a railroad debt crisis, it was reorganized as the Little Rock and Fort Smith Railway. A number of towns were established in the 1890s on the north bank of the river along its right of way. Many farmers purchased land that had been owned by the railway. After complaints about how difficult it was to cross the river at times, a second courthouse was established at Charleston for citizens in the settlements south of the river, sometime in the 1890s, probably after 1892 since "Charleston" did not appear in an 1893 railroad map in all capital letters as "OZARK" did. In 1906 the railway was acquired by the St. Louis, Iron Mountain and Southern Railway. In 1917 the line became a backbone of the MoPac, which merged into the Union Pacific Railroad in 1982.
The reality television show, The Simple Life, starring Nicole Richie and Paris Hilton was filmed in Altus in 2003.
In 2026, Arkansas Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders sought to build a 3,000-bed prison in the county. Franklin County residents opposed this.