Boyd, TX

Boyd sits seven miles south of Decatur on State Highway 114, in southern Wise County and about 30 miles northwest of the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex. Farmers first settled here in the early 1890s along the North Fork of the Trinity River. They called the place Greasy Bend for the hog-fattening trade. The Rock Island line arrived in 1893, the settlement became Parkhurst, and railroad officials soon pushed for another name because Parkhurst could be confused with nearby Park Springs. Residents chose Boyd, after railroad executive H. S. Boyd.

The town incorporated in 1895 and became a retail point for area farmers. Cotton and livestock led the local economy through the 1940s; melons followed, and by the late 1950s Boyd was serving people who worked in Fort Worth. Boyd Independent School District now carries the town's four-school system from elementary through high school. The name changes tell the practical story of the place: farming built the settlement, the railroad gave it a town site, and the growing Fort Worth orbit widened its daily connections.