Booth is a small

unincorporated community An unincorporated area is a parcel of land that is not governed by a local general-purpose municipal corporation. (At p. 178.) They may be governed or serviced by an encompassing unit (such as a county) or another branch of the state (such as th ...

Fort Bend County, Texas Fort Bend County is a county located in the U.S. state of Texas. The county was founded on December 29, 1837, and organized the next year. It is named for Fort Bend, a blockhouse at a bend of the Brazos River. The community developed around th ...

, United States. According to the

Handbook of Texas The Texas State Historical Association (TSHA) is an American nonprofit educational and research organization dedicated to documenting the history of Texas. It was founded in Austin, Texas, United States, on March 2, 1897. In November 2008, the ...

, the community had a population of 60 in 1990. It is located within the

Greater Houston Greater Houston, designated by the Office of Management and Budget, United States Office of Management and Budget as Houston–Pasadena–The Woodlands, is the List of metropolitan statistical areas, fifth-most populous metropolitan statistical ...

metropolitan area.

History

The property on which today's community stands was granted to Henry Jones (1789–1861) in Stephen F. Austin's Texas

colony A colony is a territory subject to a form of foreign rule, which rules the territory and its indigenous peoples separated from the foreign rulers, the colonizer, and their ''metropole'' (or "mother country"). This separated rule was often orga ...

. Freeman Irby Booth, a wealthy landowner who owned a cotton gin, general store, lumberyard, and syrup mill, founded the settlement in the 1890s. The community received a post office in 1894. Two years later there was a Baptist church and 150 residents. By 1914, a population of about 300 was served by a bank and telephone connections. From the mid-1920s through 1948, about 100 people lived in the settlement. During the 1940s, Booth had two churches, a cemetery, and several scattered houses, but by the end of the decade, there were only 40 persons living there. In the 1980s there were two businesses and several scattered homes, and by 1990, there were about 60 residents. Irby Booth traveled to

South Carolina South Carolina ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders North Carolina to the north and northeast, the Atlantic Ocean to the southeast, and Georgia (U.S. state), Georg ...

and invited 30 families from that state to settle here in the 1890s. The community was a shipping port for

cotton Cotton (), first recorded in ancient India, is a soft, fluffy staple fiber that grows in a boll, or protective case, around the seeds of the cotton plants of the genus '' Gossypium'' in the mallow family Malvaceae. The fiber is almost pure ...

corn Maize (; ''Zea mays''), also known as corn in North American English, is a tall stout Poaceae, grass that produces cereal grain. It was domesticated by indigenous peoples of Mexico, indigenous peoples in southern Mexico about 9,000 years ago ...

, and rice along the

Brazos River The Brazos River ( , ), called the ''Río de los Brazos de Dios'' (translated as "The River of the Arms of God") by early Spanish explorers, is the 14th-longest river in the United States at from its headwater source at the head of Blackwater ...

. In the early 1900s, Booth had a syrup mill and a sawmill. It was also a shipping point for

sugarcane Sugarcane or sugar cane is a species of tall, Perennial plant, perennial grass (in the genus ''Saccharum'', tribe Andropogoneae) that is used for sugar Sugar industry, production. The plants are 2–6 m (6–20 ft) tall with stout, jointed, fib ...

alfalfa Alfalfa () (''Medicago sativa''), also called lucerne, is a perennial plant, perennial flowering plant in the legume family Fabaceae. It is cultivated as an important forage crop in many countries around the world. It is used for grazing, hay, ...

, and vegetables along the

Gulf, Colorado and Santa Fe Railway The Gulf, Colorado and Santa Fe Railway (GC&SF) was chartered in Texas in 1873 to build a railroad from Galveston, Texas, to Santa Fe, New Mexico. By 1886, it had built from Galveston to a junction in Temple, Texas, which was founded by the co ...

Geography

Booth is located along Farm to Market Road 2759 and the

Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway The Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway , often referred to as the Santa Fe or AT&SF, was one of the largest Class 1 railroads in the United States between 1859 and 1996. The Santa Fe was a pioneer in intermodal freight transport; at vario ...

, southeast of

Richmond Richmond most often refers to: * Richmond, British Columbia, a city in Canada * Richmond, California, a city in the United States * Richmond, London, a town in the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames, England * Richmond, North Yorkshire, a town ...

in eastern Fort Bend County.

Education

Booth had its own school in 1896. In 1926, it had two schools for 85 White and 177 Black students. The school continued to operate in the 1940s. Today, Booth is zoned to schools in the

Lamar Consolidated Independent School District Lamar Consolidated Independent School District, also Lamar Consolidated ISD, Lamar CISD or LCISD, is a public school district in the U.S. state of Texas within the Houston–Sugar Land–Metropolitan Area. Lamar CISD includes al ...

. The schools include William C. Velazquez Elementary School, Reading Junior High School, and

George Ranch High School George Ranch High School is a secondary school located in unincorporated Fort Bend County, Texas, United States, south of Richmond. The school is part of the Lamar Consolidated Independent School District. The school was established in fall 20 ...

Notable person

Senfronia Thompson Senfronia Calpernia Thompson (born January 1, 1939) is a state legislator in Texas. A Democrat, she has been a member of the Texas House of Representatives since 1972 representing the 141st District. She is the former dean of women Legislators ...

, legislator for the

Texas House of Representatives The Texas House of Representatives is the lower house of the bicameral Texas Legislature. It consists of 150 members who are elected from single-member districts for two-year terms. There are no Term limits in the United States, term limits. The ...

, was born in the community.

Gallery

File:Booth Texas Road Sign.JPG, View east on FM 2759 showing Booth sign File:Booth TX Old Trading Post.JPG, Old Trading Post on Agnes Road File:Booth TX Old School.JPG, Abandoned schoolhouse in Booth File:Booth TX House 1911.jpg, Residence of F.I. Booth on 1911 postcard File:Booth TX Locomotive 1911.jpg, Train and station at Booth in 1911 postcard

References

Unincorporated communities in Texas Unincorporated communities in Fort Bend County, Texas Greater Houston {{FortBendCountyTX-geo-stub