Houston

=== Early settlement to the 20th century ===
The Allen brothers—[[Augustus Chapman Allen|Augustus Chapman]] and [[John Kirby Allen|John Kirby]]—explored town sites on Buffalo Bayou and [[Galveston Bay]]. According to historian David McComb, "[T]he brothers, on August 26, 1836, bought from Elizabeth E. Parrott, wife of T.F.L. Parrott and widow of John Austin, the south half of the lower league [{{convert|2214|acre|ha|adj=on}} tract] granted to her by her late husband. They paid $5,000 total, but only $1,000 of this in cash; notes made up the remainder."<ref>{{cite book |title=Houston: A History |first=David G. |last=McComb |publisher=University of Texas Press |location=Austin |year=1981 |edition=2nd |page=11}}</ref>

The Allen brothers ran their first advertisement for Houston just four days later in the ''Telegraph and Texas Register'', naming the notional town in honor of Sam Houston, who would become [[President of the Republic of Texas|President]] later that year.<ref name="HouHTO" /> They successfully lobbied the [[Congress of the Republic of Texas|Republic of Texas Congress]] to designate Houston as the temporary capital, agreeing to provide the new government with a state capitol building.<ref name="tsha_AC">{{cite web |title=Allen, Augustus Chapman |first=Amelia W. |last=Williams |publisher=Texas State Historical Association |series=Handbook of Texas Online |access-date=April 12, 2018 |date=August 24, 2016 |url=https://tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/fal17 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180412212254/https://tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/fal17 |archive-date=April 12, 2018 |url-status=live }}</ref> About a dozen persons resided in the town at the beginning of 1837, but that number grew to about 1,500 by the time the Texas Congress convened in Houston for the first time that May.<ref name="HouHTO" /> The Republic of Texas granted Houston incorporation on June 5, 1837, as [[James Sanders Holman|James S. Holman]] became its first mayor.<ref name="HouHTO" /> In the same year, Houston became the county seat of Harrisburg County (now Harris County).<ref name="SHQa4">{{cite journal |last=Looscan |first=Adele B. |title=Harris County, 1822–1845 |journal=Southwestern Historical Quarterly |volume=19 |pages=37–64 |year=1914 |url=http://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth101064/m1/201/ |access-date=March 18, 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160327054226/http://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth101064/m1/201/ |archive-date=March 27, 2016 |url-status=live }}</ref>

In 1839, the Republic of Texas relocated its capital to [[Austin, Texas|Austin]]. The town suffered another setback that year when a yellow fever epidemic claimed about one life for every eight residents, yet it persisted as a commercial center, forming a symbiosis with its Gulf Coast port, Galveston. Landlocked farmers brought their produce to Houston, using Buffalo Bayou to gain access to Galveston and the Gulf of Mexico. Houston merchants profited from selling staples to farmers and shipping the farmers' produce to Galveston.<ref name=HouHTO/>

The great majority of enslaved people in Texas came with their owners from the older slave states. Sizable numbers, however, came through the domestic slave trade. [[New Orleans]] was the center of this trade in the Deep South, but slave dealers were in Houston. Thousands of [[Slavery in the United States|enslaved]] black people lived near the city before the [[American Civil War]]. Many of them near the city worked on sugar and cotton plantations,<ref>{{Cite web|date=December 21, 2016|title=Blood and Sugar|url=https://www.texasmonthly.com/articles/sugar-land-slave-convict-labor-history/|access-date=July 29, 2020|website=Texas Monthly|language=en}}</ref> while most of those in the city limits had domestic and artisan jobs.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Texas History|url=http://www.brookelandisd.net/page/open/3151/0/Chapter%2017%20Section%204%20Reading.pdf}}</ref>

In 1840, the community established a chamber of commerce, in part to promote shipping and navigation at the newly created port on Buffalo Bayou.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.houstontx.gov/savvy/archives/sum06/sum06_heritage.htm |first=John |last=Perry |title=Born on the Bayou: city's murky start|url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111218055155/http://www.houstontx.gov/savvy/archives/sum06/sum06_heritage.htm |archive-date=December 18, 2011 |work=City Savvy |edition=Online |date=Summer 2006 |publisher=City of Houston}}</ref>

[[File:Old map-Houston-1873.jpg|thumb|left|Houston, {{Circa|1873}}]]

By 1860, Houston had emerged as a commercial and [[Railroad|railroad hub]] for the export of cotton.<ref name="SHQa4" /> Railroad spurs from the Texas inland converged in Houston, where they met rail lines to the ports of Galveston and [[Beaumont, Texas|Beaumont]]. During the American Civil War, Houston served as a headquarters for Confederate Major General [[John B. Magruder]], who used the city as an organization point for the [[Battle of Galveston]].<ref name="Sabine">{{cite book |last=Cotham |first=Edward T. |title=Sabine Pass: The Confederacy's Thermopylae |year=2004 |publisher=[[University of Texas Press]] |location=Austin |isbn=978-0-292-70594-4}}</ref> After the Civil War, Houston businessmen initiated efforts to widen the city's extensive system of bayous so the city could accept more commerce between Downtown and the nearby port of Galveston. By 1890, Houston was the railroad center of Texas.<ref>{{cite news |title=Houston Was the Railroad Center of Texas {{!}} RBH |url=https://resurgencebehavioralhealth.com/blog/by-1890-houston-was-the-railroad-center-of-texas/ |access-date=January 16, 2022 |work=Resurgence Behavioral Health |date=December 13, 2021}}</ref>

In 1900, after Galveston was struck by a devastating [[Galveston Hurricane of 1900|hurricane]], efforts to make Houston into a viable deep-water port were accelerated.<ref>[http://www.tsl.state.tx.us/governors/rising/sayers-galv.html J.H.W. Stele to Sayers, September 11–12, 1900] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101117083321/http://www.tsl.state.tx.us/governors/rising/sayers-galv.html |date=November 17, 2010 }}. ''Texas State Library & Archives Commission'', Retrieved on August 31, 2007</ref> The following year, the discovery of [[petroleum|oil]] at the [[Spindletop]] [[oil field]] near Beaumont prompted the development of the Texas petroleum industry.<ref>{{cite book |title=Oil in Texas: The Gusher Age, 1895–1945 |last=Olien |first=Diana Davids |author2=Olien, Roger M. |year=2002 |publisher=University of Texas Press |location=Austin |isbn=978-0-292-76056-1}}</ref> In 1902, President [[Theodore Roosevelt]] approved a $1 million improvement project for the Houston Ship Channel. By 1910, the city's population had reached 78,800, almost doubling from a decade before. African Americans formed a large part of the city's population, numbering 23,929 people, which was nearly one-third of Houston's residents.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.houstonhistory.com/decades/history5h.htm |title=Marvin Hurley, 1910–1920, Houston History |access-date=April 6, 2008 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080419095802/http://www.houstonhistory.com/decades/history5h.htm |archive-date=April 19, 2008 |url-status=live }}</ref>

President [[Woodrow Wilson]] opened the deep-water Port of Houston in 1914, seven years after digging began. By 1930, Houston had become Texas's most populous city and Harris County the most populous county.<ref>{{cite web |last=Gibson |first=Campbell |title=Population of the 100 Largest Cities and Other Urban Places in the United States: 1790 to 1990 |publisher=U.S. Census Bureau |date=June 1998 |url=https://www.census.gov/library/working-papers/1998/demo/POP-twps0027.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181005195810/http://www.census.gov/library/working-papers/1998/demo/POP-twps0027.html |archive-date=October 5, 2018}}</ref> In 1940, the [[United States Census Bureau|U.S. Census Bureau]] reported Houston's population as 77.5% White and 22.4% Black.<ref name="census1"/>