La Porte, Texas

Everything La Porte is known for

10 songs mention this city 2 artists from here

La Porte, Texas, founded in 1892 on the shores of upper Galveston Bay, has deep musical roots for a city its size. Country artists Jake Worthington and B.B. Watson are both from La Porte, and songs in our collection like "Harris County Blues" by Jesse Dayton are tied to the area.

The city's bayfront also holds a piece of Texas music history: the Sylvan Beach Pavilion, a dance hall that drew big bands and touring acts in its mid-century heyday and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

Music in La Porte

Songs About La Porte

Supermarine
Hans Zimmer
100%
Go Rest High on That Mountain
Vince Gill
100%
Hurt
Johnny Cash
100%
Take Me to Texas
George Strait
44%
"Where a pride rose from the ashes of San Jacinto"
The Beast
Jóhann Jóhannsson
24%
Cornfield Chase
Hans Zimmer
23%
Elegy
Lisa Gerrard
21%
harris county blues
jesse dayton
20%
Remains
Volker Bertelmann
19%
Harris county jail
luba dvorak

Artists From La Porte

J
Jake Worthington
country Pop: 46
B
B.B. Watson
country Pop: 6

Rivers & Roads in Song near La Porte

Songs written about the waterways and highways that run near La Porte.

Interstate 10 32 songs Interstate 45 7 songs US Route 90 8 songs Trinity River 10 songs U.S. Route 59 7 songs FM 3005 2 songs

History of La Porte

The Floating Glass Ballroom on the Bay RoadyGoat

Right on the water sits one of the most distinctive dance halls in Texas, an octagonal glass-walled ballroom that seems to float above Sylvan Beach Park. After a 1930s dance pavilion here, once billed as one of the largest in the South, was wiped out in 1943, Harris County bought the park in 1954 and hired the Houston architecture firm Greacen and Brogniez to design something a hurricane could not so easily take. What they built and opened in May 1956 is pure mid-century modern: an elevated octagon wrapped in glass, holding a large circular wood dance floor that appears to hover over the grounds, with the design nodding to the German and Czech immigrant dance halls of the region. For decades the Sylvan Beach Pavilion hosted everything from big-band orchestras to country, jazz, and blues, and it became the place generations of Harris County families held their proms, weddings, and quinceaneras. Named a Recorded Texas Historic Landmark, it still stands at Sylvan Beach Drive on the 500 block of Bayshore, neon-era glamour anchored to a working bay. (Source: Texas Historical Commission marker; Harris County Historical Commission.)

RoadyGoat →

They Sank a Tunnel Under the Ship Channel RoadyGoat

For 42 years, drivers leaving La Porte for Baytown did something quietly remarkable: they drove under the Houston Ship Channel, through a tunnel that had literally been floated into place and sunk. The Baytown Tunnel, completed in 1953, was a 4,110-foot, two-lane vehicle tube built with the immersed-tube method, an elegant piece of engineering. Rather than boring through the bay mud, crews dredged a trench across the channel floor, then prefabricated huge steel-and-concrete tunnel sections on land, sealed their ends with bulkheads so they floated, towed them out, and carefully lowered them into the trench one by one, joining them underwater and pumping them dry. The result replaced the slow, crowded Morgan's Point ferry and cost more than 10 million dollars. The tunnel had a built-in flaw, though: its low clearance and two narrow lanes couldn't handle the ship channel's growing traffic. When the soaring Fred Hartman Bridge opened in 1995, the tunnel closed, and to let the Army Corps of Engineers deepen the channel, it was dismantled piece by piece, the last section pulled out on September 14, 1999. The doorway under the bay is gone, but the engineering still impresses. (Source: Wikipedia; University of Houston-Clear Lake archives.)

RoadyGoat →

La Porte, TX RoadyGoat

The air in La Porte still carries a faint whiff of change, even years after the ITC fire. That massive petrochemical storage facility, right on the edge of the Ship Channel, went up in flames back in 2019. For days, the sky was choked with black smoke, and the smell…well, it clung to everything. People remember the ash falling like snow, the mandatory shelter-in-place orders, and the constant updates on air quality. It wasn't just the immediate danger, but the lingering worry about long-term health effects that got to folks. The community really pulled together, though. Neighbors helped neighbors, sharing information and resources. Local businesses donated supplies, and volunteers worked tirelessly to support those affected. But the fire also exposed some fault lines. Questions were raised about the proximity of industrial facilities to residential areas, about emergency preparedness, and about the regulations governing these kinds of plants. The plume drifted far, impacting other communities along Galveston Bay, and the incident sparked a broader conversation about environmental justice and the responsibilities of the petrochemical industry that defines so much of the Houston area's economy. Even now, those conversations are ongoing, shaping La Porte's future as it balances its industrial heritage with the health and safety of its residents.

West, Emily D.

1836

Emily D. West, erroneously called Emily Morgan by those who presumed her a slave of James Morgan and the "Yellow Rose of Texas" by twentieth-century myth-makers, was born a free Black in New Haven, Connecticut. She signed a contract with agent James Morgan in New York City on October 25, 1835, to work a year as housekeeper at the New Washington Association 's hotel, Morgan's Point, Texas. Morgan was to pay her $100 a year and provide her transportation to Galveston Bay on board the company's schooner, scheduled to leave with thirteen artisans and laborers in November. She arrived in Texas in December on board the same vessel as Emily de Zavala and her children. On April 16, 1836, while James Morgan was absent in Galveston in command of Fort Travis, Mexican cavalrymen under command of Col. Juan N. Almonte arrived at New Washington to seize President David G. Burnet , who was embarking on a schooner for Galveston Island. As the president and his family sailed away, the troops seized Emily and other Black servants at Morgan's warehouse, along with a number of White residents and workmen. Gen. Antonio López de Santa Anna arrived at New Washington the following day, and after three days of resting and looting the warehouses, he ordered the buildings set afire and departed to challenge Sam Houston 's army, which was encamped about ten miles away on Buffalo Bayou. Emily was forced to accompany the Mexican army. With regard to the Yellow Rose legend, she may have been in Santa Anna's tent when the Texans charged the Mexican camp on April 21, but it was not by choice. She could not have known Houston's plans, nor could she have intentionally delayed Santa Anna. Moreover, in their official reports after returning to Mexico, none of his disaffected officers mentioned the presence of a woman or even that el presidente was in a state of undress. After the battle Emily found refuge with Isaac N. Moreland , an artillery officer, who later made his home in Houston and served as county judge. Strangers assumed Emily was James Morgan's slave because she was Black. A story was told around campfires and in barrooms that Emily had helped defeat the Mexican army by a dalliance with Santa Anna. The only discovered documentation for this in the nineteenth century was a chance conversation in 1842 between a visiting Englishman and a veteran on board a steamer from Galveston to Houston. William Bollaert recorded in his journal, "The battle of San Jacinto was probably lost to the Mexicans, owing to the influence of a Mulatta Girl (Emily) belonging to Col. Morgan who was closeted in the tent with G'l Santana." Bollaert does not identify the veteran or say Emily was Morgan's slave. The edited diary, published in 1956, included that notation as a footnote with Bollaert's name attached, a fact that led readers to believe the note was a footnote in the original manuscript. The editor's 1956 footnote launched prurient interest on the part of two amateur historians who concocted the modern fiction. Francis X. Tolbert , a prolific journalist, says in his The Day of San Jacinto (1959) that Emily was a "decorative long-haired mulatto girl...Latin looking woman of about twenty." No footnote documents this description or the author's statement that she was in Santa Anna's tent. Tolbert also presumptively identified Morgan as the informant. Henderson Shuffler , also a journalist, became a publicist for Texas A&M University in the 1950s, wrote historical articles for the Southwestern Historical Quarterly , and made speeches while working at the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center at the University of Texas in the 1960s. On one occasion he said Emily was "the M'latta Houri" of the Texas Revolution , a "winsome, light-skinned...slave of James Morgan." He added that she was a fitting candidate for the identity of the girl in the then-popular Mitch Miller version of "The Yellow Rose of Texas." Shuffler credited Tolbert for bringing Emily's story out into the open and

Tsha Handbook →

Bayland Guards

1861

On April 27, 1861, Dr. Ashbel Smith organized a group of volunteers from Bayland (now Baytown) and Cedar Bayou in Harris County, and Barbers Hill in Chambers County. The group, known as the Bayland Guards, drilled on Smith’s Evergreen Plantation and worked in local defense of Galveston Bay. On August 13, 1861, they mustered into the Confederate forces as Company C of the Galveston Infantry Regiment. The regiment was redesignated in October as the Second Texas Infantry Regiment and that December, it moved to Camp Bee in Houston. Among the Bayland Guards were three sons of Republic of Texas presidents Sam Houston and Anson Jones: Samuel Houston, Jr., Charles Elliot Jones and Samuel Edward Jones. The Bayland Guards fought with the rest of the regiment at the Battles of Shiloh, Corinth and Hatchie Bridge in 1862. At the Battle of Shiloh, half of Company C was wounded or killed. During the Vicksburg campaign in 1863, the Second Texas distinguished itself by defending a crescent-shaped fortification in the center of the line of Confederate defense while withstanding Union assaults and 46 days and nights of shelling and bombardment. The Second Texas infantry and the other defenders were surrendered at Vicksburg on July 4, 1863 and were promptly paroled to make their way back to Texas. The decimated regiment reorganized at Houston in the fall of 1863 and served out the war on the Texas coast from Matagorda to Galveston, helping to deter General Banks’ attempt to invade Texas early in 1864. The regiment was surrendered on May 26, 1865. After the war, many members of the Bayland Guards became leaders and respected individuals in their communities.

Historical Marker → · 3.6 mi away

Smith, Ashbel, M. D.

1805

(1805-1885) Born in Hartford, Connecticut, this prominent physician, statesman, soldier, and educator received his degree from Yale Medical College in 1828. After a period of study in France, Smith returned to the United States to practice medicine in the state of North Carolina. He determined to go to Texas upon hearing news of the events of the mid-1830s and arrived in 1837, too late to participate in the revolution. He soon, however, was appointed surgeon-general of the Texas army and established a home, known as Evergreen Plantation, one mile east of this site. Smith later served the Republic of texas as secretary of state and as minister to Great Britain, France, Belgium, and Spain. After Texas attained statehood, Smith served several terms in the State Legislature. A Civil War veteran, he was elected captain of the Bayland Guards and colonel of the 2nd Texas Infantry of the Confederate army. Also noted for his work in higher education, Ashbel Smith served as president of the first Board of Regents of the University of texas and led support for establishment of its medical branch in Galveston. A significant leader during Texas' formative years, Ashbel Smith died at his home on Evergreen Plantation and is buried in the state cemetery in Austin.

Historical Marker → · 4.4 mi away

Historic La Porte Colored School

1909

Prior to the establishment of a public school in La Porte, African American students were educated at a local church where students attended class during the week and religious services were held in the evening and on weekends. Around 1909, a dedicated school building, the former Morgan’s Point Methodist Church, was purchased and moved to this location. The schoolhouse at that time was a one-room, wood frame building that served grades one through eight. Students wishing to continue their education after eighth grade attended George Washington Carver High School in Baytown, eight miles to the northeast. According to oral history, Viola Dewalt was the school’s teacher until her retirement in 1943. She was so integral to the school that many referred to it as “Mrs. Dewalt’s school.” In 1943, a two-room building was moved to an adjacent lot. Classes were moved into the two-room building with grades one through four in one room and grades five through eight in the other. The desks and stage remained in the smaller building for plays and musical productions by the students. Local churches were allowed to use the building for meetings and other events. In 1953, a new brick school was built on North 6th and Madison for the African American community and this campus was closed. The original one-room building was used by the La Porte chapter of the Order of the Eastern Star as a meeting hall during the 1980s and 1990s. This school, reconstructed with a new addition in 2018 using some salvaged original materials, is a tangible reminder of early African American education in La Porte.

Historical Marker →

Haydon, George W.

1839

George W. Haydon (Hayden), priest, son of Joseph and Sallie (Hoskins) Haydon, was born in Marion County, Kentucky, in the early 1800s. He and Edward A. Clarke were the first American-born Catholic priests to settle and minister in Texas. Haydon attended St. Mary's College near his home. Sometime before 1824, along with his childhood friend Clarke, he entered St. Thomas Seminary in the Diocese of Bardstown; the two completed their ecclesiastical studies at St. Joseph's Seminary and were ordained at St. Joseph's Cathedral on September 30, 1832. Haydon apparently joined Clarke on the teaching staff of St. Joseph's College after a few years of pastoral work and was appointed vice president of that institution in October 1838. In March 1839 the two decided to go to Texas as missionaries, at the request of a number of Kentucky and Missouri Catholics planning to migrate to the young republic. In a letter to John Timon , visitor (soon prefect) of Texas, Haydon offered Clarke's and his own services as priests, expressed their common desire to open a school, and requested information about the San Antonio area. Reported doubts about their qualifications for pastoral work on the frontier delayed Timon's approval, but the Kentuckians finally left their homeland and arrived in Texas before the end of the year. They were received by Bishop Anthony Blanc of New Orleans, administrator of what later became the Diocese of Galveston, who provided them with faculties for active ministry in Texas; they also obtained a letter of introduction to President Mirabeau B. Lamar from the Abbé Anduze, in which the chaplain of the French fleet described them as "the advanced guard of a numerous emigration of respectable families who leave Kentucky." Once in Texas, the two priests visited the settlements of about 100 Kentuckians established in Brazoria and then proceeded to make long missionary circuits of the republic. In 1840 Haydon settled at Refugio, where he started to repair the old mission church, and Clarke moved to Brown's Settlement on the Lavaca River, where he helped the residents build St. Mary's Church. While residing in separate locations, the friends still managed to work together in the construction, amid the Lavaca farms, of a two-story log cabin "with a passage in the middle" designed to serve as a school for children and unlettered adults in the region. In 1841 Jean Marie Odin , newly appointed vicar apostolic of Texas, put Haydon in charge of the Galveston Bay district. Haydon had scarcely begun his new assignment when he was stricken by yellow fever while assisting the victims of an epidemic near the mouth of the San Jacinto River. He died in October 1841. The exact place of his burial is unknown, but it is thought to be near the present town of Morgan's Point. Haydon was probably the first American-born priest to die on Texas soil.

Tsha Handbook →

Morgan's Point, TX

1822

Morgan's Point, also known as Rightor's, Hunter's, and Clopper's Point, a resort and residential district, is twenty miles south of Houston at the junction of Buffalo Bayou and the San Jacinto River, at the northwestern extremity of Galveston Bay in southeastern Harris County. The community was first settled around 1822 by Nicholas Rightor , who lived at the end of the point. He sold the property by 1824 to Johnson Calhoun Hunter , after which it was known as Hunter's Point. About 1828 Nicholas Clopper and his three sons, including Joseph C. Clopper, bought the site, renamed it Clopper's Point, and planted orange and lemon seeds. Nicholas Clopper sold James Morgan a 1,600-acre strip of land between the San Jacinto River and Galveston Bay on December 22, 1834. By 1835 Morgan had opened a store, built a warehouse, and, acting as agent for the New Washington Association , founded a colony called New Washington. The planned development failed but left orange groves and herds of cattle in the area. A few buildings had been erected by 1836, when Mexican troops under Juan N. Almonte camped at the site, secured supplies, and burned warehouses. Early interest in channel improvement on Buffalo Bayou was delayed by the Civil War , but the establishment of a Confederate shipyard at the mouth of Goose Creek in 1864 proved the feasibility of dredging the harbors. Charles Morgan , the "father of the Houston Ship Channel," was instrumental in completing the work to Morgan's Point in 1876. The Tabbs Bay Causeway and Morgan Point ferry connected the north and south sides of the Houston Ship Channel by 1933, replacing the free ferry that had operated since 1917; the causeway was later destroyed by Hurricane Carla ( see HURRICANES ). Morgan's Point was incorporated in 1949. The Baytown-La Porte tunnel under San Jacinto Bay was completed in 1953. It closed in 1995 after the opening of the Fred Hartman Bridge. In the 1970s encroachment on the community by a nearby containerized shipping center prompted residents to campaign for preservation of the town's cemetery, city hall, and nineteenth-century homes. The population rose from fifty in 1946 to 650 in 1953, then fluctuated from a high of 716 in 1980 to a low of 428 in 1983. In 1990 it was 460. By 2000 the population was 336, and in 2010 it was 339. The Morgan's Point Cemetery, started by James Morgan on Orange Grove, the family estate, is marked by a state historical marker.

Tsha Handbook →

Things to Do in La Porte

historical 8.6 mi away
Space Center Houston

Houston we have a problem. Every word spoken between Apollo astronauts and Earth came through Mission Control at NASAs Johnson Space Center in Houston. The…
historical 9.3 mi away
NASA Johnson Space Center

Houston we have a problem. Where Mission Control guided Apollo 11 to the moon.
food 19.9 mi away
The Original Ninfa's on Navigation

Ninfa Laurenzo was a widow with five kids when she opened a little restaurant in her late husbands failing tortilla factory on Navigation Boulevard in 1973.…
historical 6.9 mi away
San Jacinto Monument

On April 21 1836 Sam Houston and nine hundred Texans caught Santa Annas army napping at San Jacinto and won Texas independence in eighteen minutes. Six hundred…
historical 6.9 mi away
San Jacinto Monument

Taller than the Washington Monument. Where Texas won independence in 18 minutes.
historical 7.6 mi away
Battleship Texas

The last surviving WWI-era dreadnought. Fought at D-Day and Iwo Jima.
food 17.1 mi away
Killen's Barbecue

Chef Ronnie Killen's Pearland powerhouse. A classically trained chef who chose brisket over fine dining. The beef rib is absurd.
quirky 22.6 mi away
Eclectic Menagerie Park

An outdoor display of giant welded-metal sculptures along the edge of the Texas Pipe and Supply pipe yard including a King Kong hanging from a crane a 20-foot…
day trip
Seafood 🍤 on the Houston Ship Channel at The Monument Inn – La Porte, TX

Featured on The Daytripper — a full-episode local travel guide.

Sports in La Porte

⭐ HOMETOWN LEGENDS Class 5A · Football

La Porte Bulldogs — La Porte — a college & pro athletic pipeline

8 alumni who reached major-college or pro sports

La Porte High School, a Class 5A powerhouse, has a proud tradition of developing athletes who excel beyond the high school fields and tracks. Many former Bulldogs have gone on to compete at the highest levels of college and professional sports. This impressive list includes NFL football players such as Terrel Bernard (Buffalo Bills), Mike Clendenen (Denver Broncos), and Curvin Richards (Dallas Cowboys, Detroit Lions).

The athletic talent from La Porte extends across multiple sports. Shaun Rogers, an NFL football player for the Detroit Lions and New York Giants, and Yusuf Scott, an NFL football player for the Arizona Cardinals, are also notable alumni. The school's legacy also includes Olympic track and field gold medalist Kerron Clement, who brought international recognition to the La Porte community.

Pro/D1 alumni
8
Class
5A
Founded
1915
Key Players
  • Terrel Bernard — NFL football player (Buffalo Bills)
  • Kerron Clement — 2-time Olympic track and field gold medalist, 4-time world championships gold medalist
  • Mike Clendenen — NFL football player (Denver Broncos)
  • Albert Regis — NFL football player (Jacksonville Jaguars)
  • Curvin Richards — NFL football player (Dallas Cowboys, Detroit Lions)
  • Shaun Rogers — NFL football player (Detroit Lions, New York Giants)
The moment

Kerron Clement is a 2-time Olympic track and field gold medalist and 4-time world championships gold medalist.

Sources: Wikipedia · SI High School (ScoreBook Live)

Everything Near La Porte

715 stories, landmarks & places within ~20 miles — the same local lore RoadyGoat plays as you drive through.

Explore La Porte on the Map
All music from Texas → · Browse more cities