Tyler, Texas

How Tyler is governed

Form of government not yet listed.

1 of 14 positions listed. Gray dashed boxes are placeholders waiting for a name.

• Mayor

  Executive

  • Don Warren per Wikidata

  The city's chief elected official. Presides over the executive branch, proposes the budget and represents the city.

  • City Manager / Administrator

    Executive

    Not yet listed. Log in to add who holds this

    The professional administrator who runs day-to-day operations (in some cities appointed by the council instead of the mayor).

    • Police Chief

      Administration & departments

      Not yet listed. Log in to add who holds this

      Leads the police department.

    • Fire Chief

      Administration & departments

      Not yet listed. Log in to add who holds this

      Leads the fire and emergency services department.

    • Public Works Director

      Administration & departments

      Not yet listed. Log in to add who holds this

      Streets, water, sewer, and city buildings.

    • Finance Director

      Administration & departments

      Not yet listed. Log in to add who holds this

      The budget, taxes, and city accounts.

    • Planning & Zoning Director

      Administration & departments

      Not yet listed. Log in to add who holds this

      Land use, zoning, building permits.

    • Parks & Recreation Director

      Administration & departments

      Not yet listed. Log in to add who holds this

      Parks, programs, and public facilities.

• City Council

  Legislative

  Not yet listed. Log in to add who holds this

  The elected body that passes ordinances, sets the tax rate and approves the budget.

  • City Clerk

    Administration & departments

    Not yet listed. Log in to add who holds this

    Keeps the official records, runs meeting agendas and, often, local elections.

  • City Attorney

    Administration & departments

    Not yet listed. Log in to add who holds this

    The city's lawyer; advises officials and prosecutes ordinance violations.

  • Boards & Commissions

    Legislative

    Not yet listed. Log in to add who holds this

    Citizen advisory bodies, such as planning, zoning appeals and library boards.

• Municipal Court

  Judicial

  Not yet listed. Log in to add who holds this

  Hears traffic, ordinance and other minor cases.

  • Municipal Judge

    Judicial

    Not yet listed. Log in to add who holds this

    Presides over the municipal court.

Website

cityoftyler.org

Looking for your county, state and federal representatives too? See who represents 75701 or everyone in Texas.

Population over time

From 96,900 in 2010 to 105,995 in 2020 (+9.4%).

History

Founding and Civil War (1846–1865)

Legal recognition of Tyler was initiated by an act of the state legislature on April 11, 1846. The Texas government created Smith County and authorized a county seat. The first plat designated a 28-block town site centered by a main square within a 100-acre (40 ha; 0.16 sq mi) tract acquired by Smith County on 6 February 1847. The new town was named for President John Tyler, who advocated for the annexation of Texas by the United States. A log building on the square's north side served as a courthouse and public meeting hall until a brick courthouse displaced it in 1852. The City of Tyler was incorporated on January 29, 1850.

Early religious and social institutions included the First Baptist Church and a Methodist church, a Masonic lodge and an Odd Fellows lodge, and Tyler's first newspaper. Though Tyler's early economy from 1847–1873 was based on agriculture, it was also well-diversified during this period. Logging was a second major industry, while complementary manufacturing included metalworking, milling wood, and leather tanning. As the seat of Smith County, the town also benefited from government activity.

The local agricultural economy relied on slave labor before the Civil War. In 1860, the population of enslaved people in Smith County was 4,982, the 4th most in east Texas. By 1860, Tyler held over 1,000 enslaved persons, which represented 35 percent of the town's population. There was strong support for secession and the Confederacy within Tyler, as a high percentage of its residents voted for secession and many of its men served in the Confederate States Army. The town was a secure enough location during the war for the Trans-Mississippi Department to establish the Tyler Ordnance Works for the resupply of its forces west of the Mississippi River.

Post–Civil War era (1865–1900)

In 1870, Bonner and Williams established Tyler's first bank. When both the Texas and Pacific Railroad and the International Railroad (Texas) originally eschewed routes through Tyler, townspeople financed the Tyler Tap Railroad to link the town to the national rail grid. Ironically, before that 21-mile line to Big Sandy, Texas was completed in 1877, Tyler had already gotten its desired rail connection when the International–Great Northern Railroad built into town in 1874. Regardless, the Tyler Tap became the seed for the 725-mile-long Texas and St. Louis Railway, which in turn formed the core of the later St. Louis Southwestern Railway, commonly known as the Cotton Belt.

On October 29, 1895, an African American suspect named Robert Henry Hillard was burned at the stake in the Smith County Courthouse Square for the alleged murder of a nineteen-year-old white woman. Denied a trial and due process, Hillard was taken from law enforcement personnel by a white mob. Hillard's executioners were never punished. Later, two entrepreneurs combined photographs from the actual lynching with others staged with actors and sold the 16-image production as a stereographic set. One of the original sets sits in the United States Library of Congress.

20th century to the present day

Toward the end of the nineteenth century, fruit orchards emerged as an important business in the regional economy. Eighty percent of the county's agricultural revenue derived from cotton as it persisted as the dominant crop in the first decades of the twentieth century. Peaches were the principal fruit crop as the county fruit tree inventory surpassed one million by 1900. In 1912, Dan Davis, an African-American man suspected of attacking a sixteen-year-old white girl named Carrie Johnson, was burned at the stake in the Smith County Courthouse Square. Disease struck the peach trees, though, and local farmers moved toward growing roses by the 1920s. Twenty years later, most of the U.S. rose supply originated in the Tyler area.

In 1971, the University of Texas system established the University of Texas at Tyler and Broadway Square Mall opened in 1975. By 1980, the population grew to 70,508 and the Roman Catholic Diocese of Tyler and East Texas Islamic Society were established in the following years. During the 2010 East Texas church burnings, two Tyler churches were destroyed, and historic preservation city planning began in 2016 as the population increased and the city continued development.

Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.

Other cities in Texas

• Houston 2,304,580
• San Antonio 1,434,625
• Dallas 1,304,379
• Austin 961,855
• Fort Worth 918,915
• El Paso 678,815
• Arlington 394,266
• Corpus Christi 317,863

All Texas cities →