Cross Plains is a small city in the southeastern corner of Callahan County, Texas, set at the crossroads of Highway 36 and State Highway 206 in the ranch country of west-central Texas, southeast of Abilene. The town grew up in the early twentieth century as a cotton-farming and railroad community, and it reached a population of more than 1,200 by 1940, a level it sustained for decades before settling to roughly 1,000 residents today. For much of its history, Cross Plains has served as a small commercial and agricultural center for the surrounding countryside. The town's most famous chapter is literary. Robert E. Howard, the pulp-fiction writer who created Conan the Barbarian and helped shape the sword-and-sorcery genre, lived in Cross Plains during the most productive years of his short career, writing many of his best-known stories from a house in town. That home survives today as the Robert E. Howard Museum, preserving his study and personal effects, and it draws devoted fans and literary pilgrims to a town that otherwise would be known mainly for its ranching and farming economy. Howard's presence gives Cross Plains an outsized cultural significance that continues to define its identity. Day to day, Cross Plains is a quiet, close-knit rural community. Public school students attend Cross Plains ISD, and the town's businesses, churches, and civic life revolve around the rhythms of a small West Texas community. Abilene, the nearest city, provides larger shopping, medical, and employment options within a reasonable drive. Cross Plains offers a traditional small-town Texas lifestyle, enriched by an unexpected literary legacy that keeps its name alive far beyond the region.