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The Republic of Texas achieved its independence from Mexico in 1836, the same year as the famous siege of the Alamo in which pioneers Jim Bowie and Davy Crockett were slain. The "Lone Star State" was the 28th state to join the Union, admitted in 1845. The name Texas is a Spanish name, which comes from an Indian word meaning "friends" or "allies." Texas is the second-largest state in the Union in area, after Alaska. Although it has a wild, frontier history, today Texas is a major producer of oil and has important centers of industry and finance.

From the 2000 Census, the largest cities by population are Houston with about 2 million, Dallas with about 1.2 million, San Antonio with about 1.1 million, Austin with about 657K, El Paso with about 564K, Fort Worth with about 535K, Arlington with about 333k, Corpus Christi with about 278k, Plano with about 222k, Garlan with about 216k, Lubbock with about 200k, and Irving with about 192K. According to the Estimated 2005 Census, Texas had 22,859,968 people.

The State of Texas

State of Texas
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Governor's Division of Emergency Management

Texas Historical Commission

United States-Mexico Chamber of Commerce

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Texas Online

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National Parks in Texas

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Abbott Texas
Abbott City Texas

Abbott is a half mile east of Interstate Highway 35 and 10 miles south of Hillsboro in south central Hill County. It was founded as a railroad town on the Missouri, Kansas and Texas line in 1881 and named for Jo Abbott. Abbott is Willie Nelson's hometown.

Abernathy Texas

Abernathy, on Interstate Highway 27 and U.S. Highway 87 eighteen miles north of Lubbock in Hale County, was founded in 1909 when the Santa Fe Railroad built from Plainview to Lubbock. It was apparently named for M. G. Abernathy.

Abilene Texas

Downtown Abilene

Abilene is in the northeast corner of Taylor County and the Taylor County seat. The city is connected east-west by Interstate Highway 20, U.S. Highway 80, and State Highway 36 and north-south by U.S. highways 83, 84, and 277.

Airport Code ABI

City of Abilene Texas

Abiline Chamber of Commerce

Abilene Convention and Visitors Bureau, Abilene CVB

Abilene Public Library

Abilene Public Library Teen Page
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Center for Contemporary Arts

Kirby Lake

The Grace Museum
The Grace Museum Children's Museum
Abilene Zoo

Abilene History

Abilene Regional Airport

Abilene Regional Airport Status

Taylor County

Abilene Gas Prices

Abeline Texas Weather & Forecast

Abilene Performing Arts
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Addison Texas

Addison is on Belt Line Road, and Dallas North Tollway thirteen miles north of downtown Dallas in northern Dallas County and southern Collin County.

Adrian Texas

Adrian, on Interstate Highway 40 and U.S. Highway 66 in south central Oldham County, originated in 1900 when the Rock Island survey west of Amarillo picked the site as a station. The town was named for Adrian Cullen, an early farmer in the area, and officially began in the summer of 1909, when the Chicago, Rock Island and Gulf Railway was completed through that portion of Oldham County.

Alamo Texas

Alamo is a city located in southern Hidalgo County, on US-83. Incorporated in 1924.

Alamo Heights Texas

Alamo Heights, off U.S. Highway 281 five miles northeast of the center of San Antonio in north central Bexar County.

Albany Texas

Albany, the county seat of Shackelford County, is at the intersection of State Highway 6 and U.S. Highway 283, in the central part of Shackelford County.

Aldine Texas

Aldine is on Farm Road 525, the Missouri Pacific Railroad, and the Hardy Toll Road, on the northern outskirts of Houston in central Harris County.

Aledo Texas

In Parker County, south of Fort Worth

Alice Texas

Alice, the county seat of Jim Wells County, is intersected by U.S. Highway 281 and State highways 44 and 359, forty-four miles west of Corpus Christi.

Allen Texas

Allen is on Farm Road 2478 eight miles southwest of McKinney in southwestern Collin County.

City of Allen Texas

Allen Chamber of Commerce

Allen Public Library

Allen Public Library Homework, Teens Page
Allen Public Library, Kids Page

Allen History

Allen Gas Prices

Allen Texas Weather & Forecast

Alpine Texas

Alpine is located in a wide valley in the foothills of the Davis Mountains in northwest Brewster County.

Alpine Performing Arts
Alpine Living Arts

Alvarado Texas

Alvarado, the oldest town in Johnson County, is at the junction of U.S. highways 67 and 81 and Interstate Highway 35W, fifteen miles east of Cleburne in eastern Johnson County.

Alvin Texas

Alvin is twelve miles southeast of Houston in northeast Brazoria County, on land originally granted to the Houston Tap and Brazoria Railroad.

Amarillo Texas

Airport Code AMA

Amistad Acres Texas
Amistad Village Texas
Amistad Reservoir

Amistad Acres, Amistad Village and Amistad Reservoir are located about 15 miles northwest of Del Rio on the Texas border with Mexico, in southern Val Verde County.

Anderson Mill Texas

Anderson Mill, sometimes called Anderson's Mill or Anderson's Mills, was located on Cypress Creek in northwestern Travis County, about sixteen miles northwest of Austin. It was named for Thomas Anderson, who came to Texas from Virginia in the late 1850s.

Andrews Texas

Andrews, the seat of Andrews County and the only incorporated town in the county, is on U.S. Highway 385 thirty-four miles north of Odessa. The town and the county were named for Richard Andrews, the first man to die in the war for Texas independence in 1835.

Angleton Texas

Angleton, on State highways 288, 35/227, and the Union Pacific Railroad, was founded in 1890 by Lewis R. Bryan, Sr., and Faustino Kiberqqv near the center of Brazoria County and named for the wife of the general manager of the Velasco Terminal Railway.

Anthony Texas

Anthony is on the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway and State Highway 20 sixteen miles northwest of downtown El Paso on the Texas-New Mexico border in El Paso County.

Aransas Pass Texas

Archer City Texas

Argyle Texas

Arlington Texas

Athens Texas

Atlanta Texas

Austin Texas

Lakes, hills, major universities, high tech, and lots of music.
Airport Code AUS

City of Austin Texas


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Austwell Texas

Austwell is on Farm Road 774 near Hynes Bay in northeastern Refugio County.

Azle Texas

Baird Texas

Located at the junction of Interstate 20 and U.S. Highway 283 in north central Callahan County.

Balch Springs Texas

Located in southeast Dallas County, approximately 16 miles southeast of downtown Dallas and approximately 34 miles southeast of Dallas/Ft. Worth International Airport.

Bastrop Texas

Bastrop, county seat of Bastrop County, is located in the center of the county, about thirty miles southeast of downtown Austin. The town is at the junction of State highways 71, 21, and 95.

City of Bastrop Texas

Bastrop Chamber of Commerce

Bastrop History

Bastrop Public Library

Bastrop Public Library Teen Expression
Bastrop Public Library Kids Page

Bastrop Gas Prices

Bastrop Texas Weather & Forecast

Bay City Texas

Bay City is the Matagorda County seat, at the junction of State Highways 35 and 60, in the north central portion of Matagorda County, ninety miles southwest of Houston.

Baytown Texas

Baytown, an industrialized city of oil refining, rubber, chemical, and carbon black plants, is on Interstate Highway 10 and State Highway 146, thirty miles east of downtown Houston in southeastern Harris and western Chambers counties.

Beaumont Texas

The city of Beaumont was named by Henry Millard. On August 24, 1826, he had married Mary Dewburleigh Borlae Warren Beaumont in Natchez Mississippi, she had died in Mississippi. Millard came to Texas in 1835, and, with his business partners, they purchased land between the settlements of Tevis Bluff and Santa Anna, and founded the city of Beaumont, named after his desceased wife.

Beaumont was a small center for cattle raisers and farmers in its early years, and with an active riverport by the late 1800s, it became an important lumber and rice-milling town. The Beaumont Rice Mill, founded in 1892, was the first commercial rice mill in Texas.

Bedford Texas

Bedford, bisected by State Highway 121, is northeast of Fort Worth in the northeast quadrant of Tarrant County, north of the West Fork of the Trinity River.

Bee Cave Texas

Bee Caves (Beecaves or Bee Cave) is at the intersection of State Highway 71 and Farm roads 620 and 2244, twelve miles west of Austin in west central Travis County. It was named by early settlers for a large cave of wild bees found near the site.

Beeville Texas
Bee County Texas

Beeville is the county seat of Bee County, and is on Poesta Creek at the intersection of US Highway 181, State Highway 59, and the Southern Pacific Railroad, in central Bee County.

Bellaire Texas

Bellaire, on Interstate Loop 610, is surrounded by Houston, West University Place, and Southside Place in southwest Harris County. William Wright Baldwin, acting as president of the South End Land Company, founded Bellaire and Westmoreland Farms after purchasing the 9,449-acre Rice Ranch in 1908. Baldwin was a native of Iowa and nationally known as vice president of the Burlington Railroad. The development was six miles from Houston on the eastern edge of the Rice Ranch, so named for former owner William Marsh Rice. qv Promotional advertising in 1909 explained that Bellaire was named for the area's Gulf breezes, but Baldwin may have named it for Bellaire, Ohio, a town served by his railroad.

Bellmead Texas

Bellmead is on State Highway 31 two miles northeast of Waco in east central McLennan County. Bellmead was founded in 1954.

Belton Texas

Belton, the county seat of Bell County, is on Nolan Creek at the junction of Interstate 35 and U.S. highways 81 and 190, near the geographic center of the county and 130 miles south of Dallas.

Benbrook Texas

Benbrook is at the intersection of Interstate Highway 20 and U.S. Highway 377, ten miles southwest of Fort Worth in southwestern Tarrant County. It was established about 1857 and originally called Miranda. The community was renamed for James M. Benbrook, a native of Indiana.

Beverly Hills Texas

Beverly Hills is an incorporated town on State Highway 6 four miles south of downtown Waco in south central McLennan County.

Big Bend Texas
Big Bend National Park

Big Bend National Park, the first national park in Texas, comprises more than 1,250 square miles (about the size of Rhode Island) in the Big Bend of the Rio Grande along more than 100 miles of the Texas-Chihuahua-Coahuila border southeast of El Paso in Brewster County. It has been described as a land of "killing heat and freezing cold; deadly drought and flash flood; arid lowland and moist mountain woodland; and a living river winding its way across the desert." The Rio Grande flows for 107 miles on the park's southern boundary, through Santa Elena, Mariscal, and Boquillas canyons, the deepest gorges on the river. In 1978 the United States Congress designated a 191-mile section of the Rio Grande a Wild and Scenic River, sixty-nine miles of which lie on the park boundary.

Big Lake Texas

Big Lake is on State Highway 137, U.S. Highway 67, seven miles north of the Crockett County line in south central Reagan County.

Big Sandy Texas

Big Sandy, also known as Big Sandy Switch, at the junction of State Highway 155, U.S. Highway 80, and Farm Road 2911, fourteen miles southwest of Gilmer in extreme southwestern Upshur County, was established in the early 1870s. Gilmer, the county seat is located 15 miles to the north.

Big Spring Texas

Big Spring, the county seat of Howard County, is at the intersection of Interstate Highway 20, U.S. highways 80 and 87, State Highway 350, Farm Road 700, in southwest central Howard County.

City of Big Spring Texas

Big Spring Area Chamber of Commerce

Big Spring Convention & Visitors Bureau

Dora Roberts Howard County Library
Howard County Library Kid's Page

Howard College

Howard College Big Spring Library

Heritage Museum of Big Spring and Howard County, Big Spring Museum

Big Spring Symphony Orchestra

Big Spring History

Big Spring State Park

Big Spring Estado Parque

Big Spring Gas Prices

Big Spring Texas Weather & Forecast

Bishop Texas

Bishop, at the junction of U.S. Highway 77, State Loop 428 and Farm Road 70 in extreme southwestern Nueces County, was originally on the Driscoll Ranch and was called Julia Siding.