Highlands, Texas: The Bayou's Former Boomtown

Highlands sits on the east bank of the San Jacinto River in eastern Harris County, a community that was a station on the Beaumont, Sour Lake and Western Railway by nineteen oh eight. The name came from the east bank of the river standing higher than the west bank, a relative term on the Gulf Coast.

Highlands incorporated briefly but then dissolved its city charter, remaining an unincorporated community today with a population of around eight thousand. It sits within the same stretch of the river as the San Jacinto battleground, where the decisive eighteen thirty-six battle of Texas independence was fought. Highlands also borders the area affected by the Highlands Acid Pit Superfund site, a legacy of industrial waste disposal that contaminated groundwater for decades.