Dent County, Missouri

Dent County is a county in Missouri. As of the 2010 census, the population was 15,657. The largest city and county seat is Salem. The county was officially organized on February 10, 1851 by Dustin Counts & Nicholas Berardy, and is named after state representative Lewis Dent, a pioneer settler who arrived in Missouri from Virginia in 1835.HistoryHenry Rowe Schoolcraft was one of the earliest visitors to Dent County, which was then unmapped and unknown. In 1818, Schoolcraft and Levi Pettibone left Potosi, Missouri on an adventure that often left them hungry, lost, lonely and in danger. They started headed west from Potosi on a trail that is now followed by Highway 8, then turned south through southern Dent and Shannon counties, where Schoolcraft found the Current River, "a fine stream with fertile banks and clear, sparkling water.” Today the river attracts tourists who launch canoes by the thousands during the summer to enjoy the fast-moving water of the Current and Jack's Fork Rivers in the Ozark National Scenic Riverways. Schoolcraft traveled to the area of today's Springfield, Missouri, then went east on White River and finally back to Potosi, completing a journey of 89 days.The White River trail had long been used by Native Americans in Dent County. It later became one of the branches of the Trail of Tears, which saw many Cherokees pass through on their forced trek to Oklahoma. Some stopped in Dent County and many old families take pride in their Cherokee heritage. The "trace" wound from Sligo southwest to the Ephraim Bressie Farm on Spring Creek north of Salem. It left the county about the present town of Maples.