The current town encompasses the sites of two communities formerly known as Keetsville and O'Day and is named for local pioneer Samuel C.

Located along the historic Trail of Tears and on the Old Wire Road, [5] and was a Butterfield Overland Mail Route[6] Flag Stop.

Keetsville traced its official settlement to Georgia native John Cureton (1795-1853), who had served as a judge in Washington County, Arkansas before settling on the Washburn Prairie about two miles north of current day Washburn in 1840 and then procured the location of the town.

In 1853, Cureton died and ownership of the land transferred to the Englishman James T. Keet (1818-1863), who then laid out the town of Keetsville.

[7] The growth of the town would be interrupted by the Civil War, as a February 1862 skirmish, a predecessor to the much larger Battle of Pea Ridge the next month in Pea Ridge, Arkansas, would result in the destruction of the fledgling town.

[10] This line ran about a half mile west of what was then Keetsville, but soon to be renamed Washburn.

[9] In the years that followed O’Day grew, adding two hotels, shops, a newspaper, dwellings and in either 1887 or 1888 a post office, while also remaining codependent of neighboring Washburn concerning educational, religious and social life.

Many of these businesses had previously been located in the old Keetsville site, but moved to take advantage of the railroad.

That same year, Irishman Timothy Patrick Mooney (1833-1912) moved his store and warehouse there from Washburn.

In 1887 Reece Brothers built a large store and Postmaster James Buchanan Hurst (1859-1934) a post-office building.

[7] In addition to the O’Day Globe, several other newspapers were published in the Washburn area through the years, including Winger’s Journal in 1869, Professor White's Gazette was published briefly and in 1911 The Washburn Review was printed for a short time.

[7] Like most early communities in the Ozark Mountains, public education in Washburn likely started in private homes and churches.

By 1888, the idea of a permanent public school district was largely settled and a vote on a bond issue[12] that year resulted in the construction of a new brick school building on land between the town of Washburn and the community of O’Day.

On the morning of March 23, 1975, the 1924 high school building caught fire and burned to the ground.

The school board quickly set up an election for April 17, 1975 to replace the building on a bond in excess of $200,000.

By the end of the 1990s increased enrollment, especially from the rural areas of the district, necessitated the need of a larger and more modern high school.

Through much of the early 20th century Washburn prospered, but the increase in automobile ownership and the elimination of passenger rail service to the town in the 1950s eventually led to a major decrease in businesses and residents.

The commercial district along Main Street, which was the heart of the former O’Day community, decayed through the second half of the 20th century, resulting in the destruction of much of the town's historic core, including the razing of the original Atlantic and Pacific Railway train station in the 1960s.

[18] According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 0.90 square miles (2.33 km2), all land.