Although saying, “Galveston County, Texas” conjures up images that are more Glen Campbell than Captain Jack Sparrow, one of the first major settlements here was Campeche, founded by the famous pirate Jean Lafitte and his brother Pierre. Lafitte created a prosperous pirate kingdom around the Galveston Bay until he was invited to leave by the US Navy.
Galveston County is located on the plains of the Gulf Coast in the southeastern part of Texas. The county is bounded on the northeast by Galveston Bay and on the northwest by Clear Creek and Clear Lake and on the south by the Galveston Seawall and beaches on the Gulf of Mexico. Much of the county covers Galveston Bay; of the county’s 873 square miles, 474 square miles is water.
The population here, as of the 2010 census, is 291,309. The median income for a household in the county was $42,419. Approximately 10 percent of families live below the poverty line.
Galveston County was formally established under the Republic of Texas in 1838. The city of Galveston was the republic’s largest city, and its center of commerce and culture. Texas soon joined the United States, and Galveston’s importance grew as it began to dominate the global cotton trade.
Although the 1900 Galveston Hurricane devastated the county, and the Port of Galveston was closed for some time, rebuilding occurred. A few decades later, the establishment of NASA’s Johnson Space Center in 1963 created new growth opportunities for the county near Clear Lake and Harris County.
Tourism gradually developed here, and today it has become a major industry in the county; in addition, Texas City has become an important petrochemical center.
An interesting community within Galveston County is the Village of Tiki Island, an Ernest Hemingway-esque neighborhood of resort-type living where the biggest sport is fishing. There are 1,016 residents here, with a median age of 50 years. Ladies, heads up: for every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 107.8 males. The median income here is $88,891, and no one lives below the poverty line. Don’t bother to write; there is a police department here, but no post office.
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