List of Texas county seat name etymologies
The following is a list of Texas county seat name etymologies, taken from the Handbook of Texas. A separate list of Texas county name etymologies, covering Texas counties instead of its county seats, is also available.
A
| County Seat | County | Named for |
|---|
| Abilene | Taylor | Abilene, Kansas, a famous cowtown |
| Albany | Shackelford | Albany, Georgia, the former home of an early settler |
| Alice | Jim Wells | Alice Gertrudis King Kleberg, the daughter of Richard King and wife of Robert Justus Kleberg III of the King Ranch |
| Alpine | Brewster | its location in mountainous West Texas |
| Amarillo | Potter | nearby Amarillo Lake and Amarillo Creek, in turn probably named for the yellow soil along their banks and shores (Amarillo is the Spanish word for yellow) |
| Anahuac | Chambers | the Anahuac region of Mexico, the ancient capital of the Aztecs |
| Anderson | Grimes | Kenneth Lewis Anderson, the last vice president of the Republic of Texas |
| Andrews | Andrews | Richard Andrews, the first Texan soldier to die in the Texas Revolution |
| Angleton | Brazoria | the wife of George W. Angle, a railroad official who had been prominent in making Velasco, Texas a deep-water port |
| Anson | Jones | Anson Jones, the last president of the Republic of Texas |
| Archer City | Archer | Branch Tanner Archer, a commissioner for the Republic of Texas |
| Aspermont | Stonewall | the Latin word for rough mountain |
| Athens | Henderson | Athens, Alabama by one of the early residents who came from there[1] |
| Austin | Travis | Stephen F. Austin, who facilitated the Anglo American colonization of Texas and is known as the Father of Texas |
|
B
| County Seat | County | Named for |
|---|
| Baird | Callahan | Matthew Baird, former owner of the Baldwin Locomotive Works |
| Ballinger | Runnels | William Pitt Ballinger, a Galveston attorney and railroad stockholder |
| Bandera | Bandera | Bandera Pass, named in turn for the Spanish word for flag |
| Bastrop | Bastrop | Felipe Enrique Neri, Baron de Bastrop, an early German settler |
| Bay City | Matagorda | its location on Bay Prairie |
| Beaumont | Jefferson | Jefferson Beaumont, brother-in-law of founder and Texas hero Henry Millard |
| Beeville | Bee | Barnard Elliott Bee, Sr., a secretary of state of the Republic of Texas |
| Bellville | Austin | Thomas B. Bell, one of the Old Three Hundred |
| Belton | Bell | its location in Bell County |
| Benjamin | Knox | Benjamin Bedford, a lightning victim and the son of Hilory H. Bedford, a president and controlling stockholder in the Wichita and Brazos Stock Company |
| Big Lake | Reagan | nearby Big Lake (which is usually dry in most years as it is located in arid West Texas) |
| Big Spring | Howard | nearby "big spring" in Sulphur Draw (a popular and often fought for location in arid West Texas; the spring remains active to this day and is now part of a local park) |
| Boerne | Kendall | Ludwig Boerne, a German author and publicist |
| Bonham | Fannin | James Butler Bonham, who died at the Alamo (ironically, Fannin County is named for the commander whose help Bonham enlisted to aid at the Alamo) |
| Boston | Bowie | Old Boston, Texas, named for store-owner W. J. Boston |
| Brackettville | Kinney | Oscar Bernadotte Brackett, an early merchant in the region |
| Brady | McCulloch | Brady Creek, which runs through the town |
| Breckenridge | Stephens | John Cabell Breckinridge, the fourteenth vice president of the United States (note the change in spelling) |
| Brenham | Washington | Richard Fox Brenham, a soldier in the Texas Revolution who had practiced medicine in the vicinity |
| Brownfield | Terry | a prominent ranching family in the area |
| Brownsville | Cameron | Fort Brown, named in turn for Major Jacob Brown, who died during an attack on the fort in the Mexican-American War |
| Brownwood | Brown | Henry Stevenson Brown, a commander at the Battle of Velasco |
| Bryan | Brazos | William Joel Bryan, a nephew of Stephen Fuller Austin who donated land for the town |
| Burnet | Burnet | David G. Burnet, president of the Republic of Texas |
|
C
| County Seat | County | Named for |
|---|
| Caldwell | Burleson | Mathew Caldwell, a signer of the Texas Declaration of Independence and soldier during the Texas Revolution |
| Cameron | Milam | Ewen Cameron, a soldier during the Texas Revolution |
| Canadian | Hemphill | Its location on the Canadian River |
| Canton | Van Zandt | Old Canton, Texas, in neighboring Smith County |
| Canyon | Randall | Nearby Palo Duro Canyon |
| Carrizo Springs | Dimmit | The nearby springs |
| Carthage | Panola | Carthage, Mississippi |
| Center | Shelby | Its location in the center of Shelby County (the town and county, though, are near the Louisiana border in East Texas) |
| Centerville | Leon | Its location in the center of Leon County (coincidentally, the town is also located almost midway between Dallas and Houston) |
| Channing | Hartley | George Channing Rivers, the paymaster of the railroad when it built through the area |
| Childress | Childress | George Campbell Childress, the chairman of the committee which authored the Texas Declaration of Independence |
| Clarendon | Donley | Clara Sully Carhart, wife of the founder (& possible homage to the Earls of Clarendon) |
| Clarksville | Red River | James Clark, the founder of the town |
| Claude | Armstrong | Claude Ayers, the engineer of the first train to travel through the area |
| Cleburne | Johnson | Patrick Ronayne Cleburne, a Confederate general in the Civil War |
| Coldspring | San Jacinto | The cold springwater found at the location |
| Coleman | Coleman | Its location in Coleman County, which was named for Robert M. Coleman, a signer of the Texas Declaration of Independence and soldier at the Battle of San Jacinto. |
| Colorado City | Mitchell | Its location on the Colorado River |
| Columbus | Colorado | Columbus, Ohio |
| Comanche | Comanche | Its location in Comanche County, which was named for the Comanche indians |
| Conroe | Montgomery | Isaac Conroe, the first postmaster of the town |
| Cooper | Delta | L. W. Cooper, a supporter of the bill creating Delta County |
| Corpus Christi | Nueces | Nearby Corpus Christi Bay, discovered by Spanish explorer Alvarez de Pineda on the Catholic Feast of Corpus Christi (Latin: "Body of Christ") |
| Corsicana | Navarro | The island of Corsica, birthplace of the parents of José Antonio Navarro, the namesake of Navarro County |
| Cotulla | La Salle | Joseph Cotulla, the developer of the town |
| Crane | Crane | William Carey Crane, a past president of the Baylor University |
| Crockett | Houston | Davy Crockett, former Tennessee member of Congress and defender of the Alamo |
| Crosbyton | Crosby | Stephen Crosby, former commissioner of the Texas General Land Office |
| Crowell | Foard | George T. Crowell, owner of the townsite |
| Crystal City | Zavala | The clear artesian water of the area |
| Cuero | DeWitt | Spanish word for "hide" or "leather:" cattle was (and still is) a major component of the local economy |
|
D
| County Seat | County | Named for |
|---|
| Daingerfield | Morris | Captain London Daingerfield, who was killed in an 1830 battle with Indians on the site that became the town in the 1840s |
| Dalhart | Dallam | Its location on the border between Dallam and Hartley counties |
| Dallas | Dallas | Uncertain: the primary report is that founder John Neely Bryan named it for his "good friend Dallas." This person is variously reported as 1) George Mifflin Dallas, the eleventh vice president of the United States; 2) his brother, Alexander Junior, an American commodore; 3) their father, Alexander Senior, United States Secretary of the Treasury around the end of the War of 1812; or 4) some other person named Dallas whose identity is uncertain. Additionally, another report has the town being named Dallas as the result of a town-naming contest in 1842. |
| Decatur | Wise | Stephen Decatur, a Revolutionary War naval hero |
| Del Rio | Val Verde | Its location on the Rio Grande |
| Denton | Denton | Methodist preacher and Indian fighter John Bunyan Denton, who was killed in 1841 at the Battle of Village Creek |
| Dickens | Dickens | Its location in Dickens County, which was named for a J. Dickens who fought in the Battle of the Alamo |
| Dimmitt | Castro | W. C. Dimmitt, a land owner and developer |
| Dumas | Moore | Louis Dumas, president of the Panhandle Townsite Company in Sherman |
|
E
F
| County Seat | County | Named for |
|---|
| Fairfield | Freestone | Unknown. |
| Falfurrias | Brooks | La Mota de Falfurrias, the grove of trees where Edward Lasater established a ranch |
| Farwell | Parmer | John V. Farwell, a Chicago merchant and a principal in the Capitol Syndicate, which built the present Texas State Capitol and owned the gigantic XIT Ranch |
| Floresville | Wilson | Canary Islands immigrant Don Francisco Flores de Abrego, who established a ranch in the area |
| Floydada | Floyd | Uncertain: The town was originally named Floyd City but was required to change it to avoid confusion with Floyd in Hunt County. The new name may have been created from garbling an intended "Floydalia" on the telegraph to Washington or by the addition of either donor James Price or his wife Caroline's mother Ada to the existing name. |
| Fort Davis | Jeff Davis | Fort Davis, which was named for Confederate president Jefferson Davis |
| Fort Stockton | Pecos | Camp Stockton, which was named in honor of Captain Robert Stockton, a prominent navy officer in the Mexican War |
| Fort Worth | Tarrant | Fort Worth, which was named for William Jenkins Worth, a general in the Mexican–American War |
| Franklin | Robertson | Old Franklin, the prior county seat, which was named for settler Francis Slauter, who had owned the land on which it was located |
| Fredericksburg | Gillespie | Prince Frederick of Prussia |
|
G
| County Seat | County | Named for |
|---|
| Gail | Borden | Gail Borden, Jr., businessman, publisher, surveyor, and inventor of condensed milk |
| Gainesville | Cooke | United States General Edmund Pendleton Gaines, a sympathizer of the Texas Revolution |
| Galveston | Galveston | Bernardo de Gálvez, a Spanish governor of the Louisiana Territory and an ally of the United States during the American Revolution |
| Garden City | Glasscock | Old Garden City, which had been intended to be Gardner City after a local store owner but was misnamed due to typographical error |
| Gatesville | Coryell | Nearby Fort Gates on the Leon River, which was named after Bvt. MJ. Collinson Reed Gates, a hero of the Mexican War |
| George West | Live Oak | George Washington West, a rancher who founded the town, paid the railroad to build through it, and paid to build the courthouse after county voters approved moving the county seat |
| Georgetown | Williamson | George Washington Glasscock, soldier of the Texan Revolution and politician, who donated the land for the site |
| Giddings | Lee | Uncertain: Most likely railroad official Jabez Deming Giddings, but possibly his brother, the politician Dewitt Clinton Giddings |
| Gilmer | Upshur | Captain Thomas W. Gilmer, United States Secretary of the Navy, who was killed along with county namesake Abel Parker Upshur when a new naval gun exploded during a demonstration aboard the USS Princeton on the Potomac. |
| Glen Rose | Somervell | An inversion of the original Rose Glen, selected by the wife of donor T.C. Jordan as a reminder of her native Scotland |
| Goldthwaite | Mills | Joe G. Goldthwaite, railroad official for the Gulf, Colorado and Santa Fe Railway who auctioned the town lots |
| Goliad | Goliad | An anagram of the name of Mexican hero Father Miguel Hidalgo |
| Gonzales | Gonzales | Rafael Gonzales, governor of Coahuila y Tejas |
| Graham | Young | Gustavus A. and Edwin S. Graham, early settlers in the area |
| Granbury | Hood | Hiram B. Granbury, Confederate General |
| Greenville | Hunt | Thomas J. Green, a general in the Texas Army in the war for independence from Mexico and, later, a member of the Congress of the Republic of Texas |
| Groesbeck | Limestone | Abram Groesbeeck, a director of the Houston and Texas Central Railway |
| Groveton | Trinity | A grove of blackjack trees situated between the town and the nearby lumber mill |
| Guthrie | King | W.H. Guthrie of Kentucky, a major stockholder of the Louisville Land and Cattle Company which owned much of the surrounding area |
|
H
| County Seat | County | Named for |
|---|
| Hallettsville | Lavaca | Settler, widow, and donor Margaret L. Hallett |
| Hamilton | Hamilton | James Hamilton, Jr., the former governor of South Carolina who gave financial aid to the Republic of Texas |
| Haskell | Haskell | Charles Ready Haskell, a soldier killed in the Goliad massacre |
| Hebbronville | Jim Hogg | James Richard Hebbron, a local rancher, who donated land for the town's railroad station. |
| Hemphill | Sabine | John Hemphill, an early Texas judge and legal scholar, and later a United States Senator |
| Hempstead | Waller | Dr. G.S.B. Hempstead of Portsmouth, Ohio, brother-in-law of town co-founder Dr. Richard Rodgers Peebles |
| Henderson | Rusk | James Pinckney Henderson, the first governor of Texas |
| Henrietta | Clay | Uncertain: The law creating Clay County stated the county seat must be named Henrietta. One theory is that Henrietta was intended as the feminized form of county namesake Henry Clay. |
| Hereford | Deaf Smith | The Hereford cattle brought to the area by early ranchers |
| Hillsboro | Hill | George Washington Hill, Republic of Texas Secretary of War and Marine, surgeon, and early settler of the area |
| Hondo | Medina | Named for the nearby Hondo Creek. Hondo in Spanish means deep. |
| Houston | Harris | General Sam Houston, commander at the Battle of San Jacinto, and later President of the Republic of Texas and Governor and Senator for the state of Texas |
| Huntsville | Walker | Postmaster Ephraim Gray's hometown of Huntsville, Alabama |
|
J
K
L
| County Seat | County | Named for |
|---|
| La Grange | Fayette | The name of the former home of General Lafayette, the Revolutionary War hero for whom Fayette County is named |
| Lamesa | Dawson | Selected in place of the grammatically correct La Mesa, so called due to flatness of surrounding region. |
| Lampasas | Lampasas | The nearby Lampasas River, which was possibly named for Lampazos, Mexico |
| Laredo | Webb | Laredo, Spain |
| Leakey | Real | John Leakey, an early settler in the area |
| Levelland | Hockley | The level topography of the surrounding South Plains |
| Liberty | Liberty | Uncertain. The town was originally platted as Villa de la Santísima Trinidad de la Libertad, "Town of the Most Holy Trinity at Liberty," in reference to its position on the Trinity and the recent success of the Mexican War of Independence. The mostly Anglo settlers quickly renamed it to Liberty, which is variously explained as a simple Anglicization of the Spanish name or as an homage to their hometown of Liberty, Mississippi. |
| Linden | Cass | Uncertain, but reportedly named after the former home of a Tennesseean immigrant |
| Lipscomb | Lipscomb | Judge Abner Smith Lipscomb, a Texian Secretary of State |
| Littlefield | Lamb | George W. Littlefield, local ranch owner and town founder |
| Livingston | Polk | Livingston, Tennessee, hometown of founder Moses L. Choate |
| Llano | Llano | The nearby Llano River, which was named for the surrounding plains |
| Lockhart | Caldwell | Byrd Lockhart, an assistant surveyor and reportedly the first Anglo to set foot in the county |
| Longview | Gregg | Supposedly, for the impressive view railroad management could see from the house of Ossamus Hitch Methvin, Sr., who sold them the land for the town. Possibly ironic, given the town's location in heavily forested East Texas. |
| Lubbock | Lubbock | Thomas Saltus Lubbock, a former Texas Ranger (some sources have Lubbock's first name as Thompson) |
| Lufkin | Angelina | Abraham P. Lufkin, a cotton merchant and Galveston city councilman, who was the son-in-law of Paul Bremond, president of the Houston, East and West Texas Railway which developed the town |
|
M
| County Seat | County | Named for |
|---|
| Madisonville | Madison | James Madison, fourth President of the United States |
| Marfa | Presidio | Uncertain, though reportedly suggested by the wife of a railroad executive from a character in Fyodor Dostoyevsky's novel The Brothers Karamazov, which she was reading at the time |
| Marlin | Falls | John Marlin, pioneer and father-in-law of town founder Samuel A. Blain |
| Marshall | Harrison | John Marshall, fourth Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court |
| Mason | Mason | Fort Mason, whose etymology is uncertain, though it was probably named after either Lt. George T. Mason, killed during the Mexican-American War at Brownsville, Texas, or for Gen. Richard Barnes Mason. |
| Matador | Motley | The Matador Ranch, which was located in the county |
| McKinney | Collin | Collin McKinney, one of five drafters and the oldest signer of the Texas Declaration of Independence, and early settler in the county |
| Memphis | Hall | Following a series of failures for the town to select a name not already in use, Rev. John Brice fortuitously noticed a letter in Austin addressed to Memphis, Texas, and marked No such town in Texas |
| Menard | Menard | Michel Branamour Menard, the founder of Galveston, Texas |
| Mentone | Loving | Old Mentone, which was named for Menton, France, the hometown of one of its early settlers |
| Meridian | Bosque | Uncertain, though most likely due to Commissioner Jasper N. Mabray's belief the town lay on or near the 98th meridian west. Surveyor George Erath had previously named Meridian Creek and Meridian Knobs for such a proximity. |
| Mertzon | Irion | M. L. Mertz, a director of the Kansas City, Mexico and Orient Railway |
| Miami | Roberts | Uncertain: Reportedly an Indian word meaning "sweetheart," but could also be named for rivers or other cities named after the Miami Indians |
| Midland | Midland | Its location midway between Fort Worth and El Paso on the Texas and Pacific Railway |
| Monahans | Ward | Thomas John Monahan, who dug the first water well between the Pecos River and Big Spring in 1881 and selected the site for a water tank |
| Montague | Montague | Daniel Montague, a state senator and early surveyor |
| Morton | Cochran | Morton Smith, a land agent hired to sell the property after the death of the original landowner |
| Mount Pleasant | Titus | A nearby Caddo burial site known as "Pleasant Mound" |
| Mount Vernon | Franklin | Mount Vernon, George Washington's homestead |
| Muleshoe | Bailey | The nearby Muleshoe Ranch |
|
N
O
P
| County Seat | County | Named for |
|---|
| Paducah | Cottle | Paducah, Kentucky, the home of an early settler |
| Panhandle | Carson | Its location in the Texas Panhandle |
| Paint Rock | Concho | Native American pictographs discovered nearby |
| Palo Pinto | Palo Pinto | Palo Pinto County |
| Palestine | Anderson | Palestine, Illinois, the home of an early settler |
| Pampa | Gray | The Argentine pampas, which George Tyng, manager of the local White Deer Land Company, stated the area resembled |
| Paris | Lamar | Paris, France |
| Pearsall | Frio | Thomas W. Pearsall, vice president of the railroad |
| Pecos | Reeves | Nearby Pecos River, which was named for the Pecos Pueblo, which is of unknown etymology |
| Perryton | Ochiltree | George M. Perry, an early county judge |
| Pittsburg | Camp | Major William H. Pitts, who settled the tract of land which eventually became the town |
| Plains | Yoakum | Unknown, but most likely for the surrounding South Plains |
| Plainview | Hale | The unobstructed view of the surrounding South Plains |
| Port Lavaca | Calhoun | Nearby Lavaca Bay, which was named for the Lavaca River, which is the Spanish translation of the original French Rivière de Les Veches, so called because La Salle found so many bison along its shore during his expedition |
| Post | Garza | Founder C. W. Post, the cereal magnate who attempted to develop the town as a Utopian community |
|
Q
R
S
| County Seat | County | Named for |
|---|
| San Angelo | Tom Green | Named San Angela by founder Bartholomew DeWitt after an unknown woman named Angela, possibly a nun sister-in-law or a wife Carolina Angela.
Emended to San Angelo after the postal service complained of the ungrammatical construction. |
| San Antonio | Bexar | Named for the San Antonio River, discovered on the Catholic Feast of Saint Anthony of Padua |
| San Augustine | San Augustine | Uncertain, but most likely for Saint Augustine of Hippo |
| San Diego | Duval | Nearby San Diego Creek, presumably named after Saint Didacus of Alcalá |
| San Marcos | Hays | Nearby San Marcos River, mistakenly named for original San Marcos (probably either the current Colorado or Navidad), which was discovered on the Catholic Feast of Saint Mark the Evangelist |
| San Saba | San Saba | Nearby San Saba River, which was discovered on the Catholic Feast of Saint Sabbas the Sanctified |
| Sanderson | Terrell | Thomas P. Sanderson, a construction engineer |
| Sarita | Kenedy | Sarita Kenedy, daughter of ranch owner John Gregory Kenedy, Sr., and granddaughter of Mifflin Kenedy |
| Seminole | Gaines | Nearby Seminole watering holes |
| Seguin | Guadalupe | Juan Seguín, Tejano soldier in the Texan Revolution |
| Seymour | Baylor | Uncertain: The most common version is the name was chosen to honor a local cowboy named Seymour Munday, but other versions report that the name was simply chosen by settler J.W. Fullock or that it was selected to honor New York Governor Horatio Seymour. |
| Sherman | Grayson | General Sidney Sherman, hero of the Texas Revolution and man credited with the battle cry "Remember the Alamo!" |
| Sierra Blanca | Hudspeth | Nearby Sierra Blanca Mountain |
| Silverton | Briscoe | Named by founder Thomas J. Braidfoot. |
| Sinton | San Patricio | A major stock-holder in the Coleman-Fulton Pasture Company |
| Snyder | Scurry | William Henry Snyder, a merchant and buffalo hunter who operated a trading post in the area |
| Sonora | Sutton | Sonora, Mexico, hometown of a family servant of landowner Charles G. Adams |
| Spearman | Hansford | Railroad executive Thomas E. Spearman |
| Stanton | Martin | Supreme Court Justice Edwin McMasters Stanton |
| Stephenville | Erath | Landowner John M. Stephens |
| Sterling City | Sterling | W.S. Sterling, an early settler |
| Stinnett | Hutchinson | Albert Sidney Stinnett of Amarillo, who helped purchase the right-of-way for the railroad |
| Stratford | Sherman | Stratford Hall Plantation, the Virginia boyhood home of Confederate General Robert E. Lee |
| Sulphur Springs | Hopkins | Nearby sulphur springs |
| Sweetwater | Nolan | Nearby Sweetwater Creek |
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References
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