David C. Hackney was one of many early East Texas sawmillers who followed the construction of the railroads to tap the most easily accessible pine stumpage. In 1880, he operated a sawmill on the Houston East and West Texas Railway, south of the Trinity River, but he later moved to Polk and Liberty counties. (See also other Hackney records). He lived in Montgomery County in 1880 at Res 97, Precinct 2-7, in the Boggy District. He employed seventeen workers.
Hackney was listed in a directory as a lumber dealer at Houston in 1884.