Located in the eastern part of the state of Texas and the seat of Gregg County which is also partly in Harrison County, Longview sits in the nearby Sabine River which is just west of Shreveport, Louisiana and is in the heart of a metropolitan area and the industrial area which includes Kilgore and Marshall. The area where the present-day Longview was settled and developed by the planters in the early start of the 19th century. The town was named by the Pacific Railroad surveyors for Texas, who were impressed by the long-distance view. The community then became a trading center for hogs, cattle, and horses that were raised in the nearby river valley. The discovery of the oil wells ushered in a period of industrial expansion and then the rapid population growth in the 1930s.