HARRIS COUNTY TEXAS

As I get more into writing my blog about Texas I realize that there is a lot to write about and I'm pretty sure it is enough to last me a life time. Whatever remaining time the Good Lord will see fit to give me that is! Just trying to cover the main cities, towns and areas has started to look like a very big and huge unmanageable task. So my plan as of now is to try and cover the 254 counties of our great state of Texas and that should be enough of a good thing. Well, maybe not, but of course I will try to throw in as much information as I can and point out a few of the towns and cities as we go along on the journey. I am also sure there will be some very interesting characters to read about. So with that little bit said, let's get started on the county I live in and have spent most of my life here.

Harris County Texas is the most populous county in Texas and was founded in 1836. The City of Houston Texas is the county seat of Harris County. The county was named after John R Harris. Harris County has a total land and water area of 1,778 square miles and the 2010 population was 4,092459. The County was actually founded as Harrisburg County but the name was later changed in 1839 to Harris County. The original Harris County Court House was built in 1913 and is still serving our needs to this very day. In my life time I have seen a lot of old courthouses on the square come down and it is always a tragedy to lose such a land mark. Let's hope we can keep this one for all the future generations.

The Harris County Department of Education has seven elected County School Trustees to oversee 26 school districts all across Harris County. It is an excellent school system and schools like Tomball ISD, Klein, Spring, Katy, Houston, Crosby, Waller, Cypress-Fairbanks, Pasadena and La Porte just to name a few, provide real quality education for our young folks starting out. I myself graduated from Tomball High School and believe that qualifies me as able to speak to the fine quality of professional teachers I had in the Harris County School system. In addition to that there are excellent colleges and universities in Harris County and more college level educational opportunities every day. With the arrival of on-line programs, Wow! this is the place to start and stay, given the great job opportunities in the county. The University of Houston is a top level college and has great 4 year degree programs which produces many of our leaders currently living and working in Houston, Texas and Harris County. Rice University is know for it's high academic standings and recognized nationally as one of the leading teaching and research universities of the United States. The campus is absolutely beautiful as I have driven past it many times. It is near the Houston Medical center and the huge oak trees are certainly a beautiful sight to see. I certainly think I should mention here the Lone Star Community college campuses in Harris County as I believe they also offer excellent college level classes without the kids having to move out from home after high school graduation. There is a campus here in the Tomball and Cypress-Fairbanks areas and from what I have seen really do a great job of offering kids a good starting place straight out of High School. Oh, and another great idea at the community colleges is the continuing study programs for anyone wanting to learn more about a hobby or job skills, like computers, etc. etc. These are excellent programs for older folks and working moms and dads that can take one or two classes here and there. I myself took my real estate classes for my Brokers license at the University of Houston Downtown school. This is a great system we have here.

Harris County has so much to offer it is hard to get my mind around all that statement represents. There are two major airports including George Bush Intercontinental and Hobby airport. Also Ellington Field a general aviation and military airport, as well as numerous privately owned airports such as West Houston airport, Dan Jones International, Weiser Air Park and David Wayne Hooks Memorial airport. There is (METRO) the metropolitan transit authority of Harris county that operates the bus lines and fairly new Metro train lines. There is Greyhound bus lines of course and Amtrak train service to take you just about any where you might want to go. There is the Port of Houston and the energy capital of the world, for lack of a better word, to describe the vast and booming economy of Harris County. The Texas Medical Center is also known for outstanding medical care and advancements on a world wide scope. No pun intended. Well maybe a little. Cancer research and heart care medicine are known to be the best available any where in the world. The Harris County hospital services operates three hospitals in the county and as well as many clinics. The major hospitals are LBJ General, Quentin Mease Community and Ben Taub General. Harris County also operates its own public library system, fire fighters and police protection.

I think I could go on for a long time about Harris County but time and space have to come into play somewhere. If you want to look up more facts and figures on Harris County just go to Goggle and type in Harris County Texas. That will get you more to read than most of us have time for this year. One more web site you might want to use some time is the Harris County Appraisal District. HCAD They give you tax information, property ownership maps, appraisals and do a really good job of it.
Go to http://www.hcad.org    http://en.wikipedia.org/ Reference link