The city began in 1836 when Augustus Chapman Allen and John Kirby Allen ran an advertisement in the local newspaper for the ‘Town of Houston’.

The brothers claimed ships would sail up Buffalo Bayou to the townsite, which featured a mixture of timber and grassland, and that the site enjoyed a healthy, cool sea breeze.

This was all an exaggeration, and they faced snags like an annual 48-inch rainfall, high humidity, and temperatures that averaged from a low of 43° F in the winter to 94° in summer.

Moreover, in January 1837, when Francis R Lubbock arrived on a small steamship, he found the bayou choked with branches and the town almost invisible. 

Although starting as a political boomtown in the nineteenth century, Houston’s livelihood depended on cotton and commerce. 

Now the population of Houston is at 2.296 million (2015), ranked as the fourth largest city in the US. More than 100 ethnic groups now share the population of the city. 

The growth of the town developed as a result of the construction of transportation systems, the location of useful natural resources, and an entrepreneurial spirit.