Simonton, TX

Simonton sits in northwest Fort Bend County at the junction of Farm roads 1093 and 1489, roughly five miles west of Fulshear and fourteen miles northwest of Richmond. The Brazos River bends along the city’s western and northern sides, and the city’s center is about two miles east of the river. Most of its two-mile-wide area lies in the river’s 100-year floodplain, and the city works with the county on high-water response, erosion concerns, and emergency coordination. Flood gauges and the Brazos are part of the practical map here, not distant background.

The older story is tied to the same river. James and Theophilus Simonton established a cotton plantation along the Brazos in the 1850s, and the railroad’s arrival in 1888 helped turn the settlement into a shipping point. By the early twentieth century, Simonton was known for potatoes, with rail siding space used to send produce across the country. A later landmark was the Round Up indoor rodeo arena, where Deng Xiaoping was entertained in 1979. Simonton incorporated as a city in 1979; today it remains a small Lamar Consolidated school community at a river edge where agriculture, transportation, and flood preparation overlap.