City of Los Fresnos

A ranch called Los Fresnos (ash trees) is said to have occupied a site as early as 1770 near where Los Fresnos exists today. The promise of railroad development in this area in the early 1900s brought trainloads of land speculators into South Texas. In 1907 Lon C. Hill, Jr. bought 14,232 acres and parceled them into lots. This eventually evolved into the layout of the original town site of modern Los Fresnos which was finally developed in 1915. Settlers, mostly farmers, were lured into the area from mid-western states. This new influx of people led to a diversification of land use in what had been almost exclusively ranch land. A post office was granted in 1919, although it closed its doors a mere three years later. With the actual arrival of the railroad in 1927 the post office was reopened in 1929 when the community had nearly 400 residents. From 1939 to 1944 the population remained at 475, growing to 1,113 in a post war boom. Throughout this time Los Fresnos was primarily a ...