Biohazard Cleanup Near South Clinton Clinton, AR

Clinton is a city in and the county seat of Van Buren County, Arkansas, and with 2,509 residents at the 2020 census it is the county's most populous city.

Clinton has been the Van Buren County seat since 1844, when it replaced Bloomington, and the first courthouse there was a one-room log structure raised by the men of the community.

The city is generally assumed to have been named for DeWitt Clinton, the New York governor and U.S. senator who built the Erie Canal, though no record survives explaining the choice; a post office named Clinton was established on December 20, 1833.

George Counts is usually described as the founder of Clinton, and the county's first cotton gin was built there in 1840, beginning operation on Christmas Day powered by two oxen.

Clinton was first incorporated on January 9, 1851, but the records were lost, so the community incorporated again on August 15, 1879 — and celebrated its centennial in 1979 based on the second date.

Sheltered in the valley of the Little Red River, Clinton was bypassed by the railroads entirely, and transportation remained inconvenient there until the automobile era.

The present Van Buren County Courthouse was built in 1934–1935 with federal funding and Works Progress Administration labor, and it is listed on the state historic registry.

An EF4 tornado struck Clinton on February 5, 2008, during the Super Tuesday tornado outbreak, killing three people and destroying many homes and businesses, including a boat manufacturing facility.

The creation of Greers Ferry Lake between 1959 and 1963 opened up tourism around Clinton, even though the lake itself lies east of town.

Clinton's first high school opened in 1879 as the Clinton Male and Female Academy, and in 1929 the city gained one of Arkansas's four state vocational schools, the Clinton State Vocational Training School.