MAHL, TEXAS. Mahl, on U.S. Highway 259 eight miles north of Nacogdoches in northern Nacogdoches County, was established around 1902 when the Texas and New Orleans Railroad was built through the area. The community's name is said to be the reverse spelling of Lham, the last name of a railroad official. A post office was established in 1902, and regular passenger traffic began in 1904. A school had an enrollment of fifty-eight that year. By 1914 Mahl had two general stores, a school, a church, a saloon, a blacksmith, a cotton gin, and an estimated population of 100. The town declined after World War I,^qv and by the early 1940s the population was twenty-five. The school closed prior to World War II,^qv and the last store closed in the 1950s. The depot later burned, and by the early 1990s only a single house and a cemetery remained at the site.

BIBLIOGRAPHY: Nacogdoches County Genealogical Society, Nacogdoches County Families (Dallas: Curtis, 1985).

Christopher Long