DEBERRY, TEXAS. DeBerry is at the junction of U.S. Highway 79 and Farm roads 31 and 1794, fourteen miles northeast of Carthage in northeastern Panola County. A community, known as Evergreen, formed there before the Civil War, after which the name of the town was changed to DeBerry, for Alfred Wesley De Berry, a prominent local citizen and legislator. A post office opened in 1874, and by 1885 the community had a steam gristmill, two churches, three schools, eight general stores, and an estimated population of 150. Its population reached 300 by the early 1890s but dropped to fifty by 1914. In the 1920s oil was discovered in the area, and DeBerry enjoyed a brief boom. By 1929 its population reached 250. In the mid-1930s the community had a church, two schools, a post office, and eight rated businesses; in 1936 the reported population was 233. After World War II the DeBerry schools were consolidated with those of Carthage. In 1990 DeBerry was a prosperous rural community with 191 inhabitants and eight businesses. In 2000 the population remained the same while the number of businesses grew to thirty.
BIBLIOGRAPHY: History of Panola County. (Carthage, Texas: Carthage Circulating Book Club, 1935?). John Barnette Sanders, Index to the Cemeteries of Panola County (Center, Texas, 1964). John Barnette Sanders, Postoffices and Post Masters of Panola County, Texas, 1845-1930 (Center, Texas, 1964).
