The History of the City of Plano Texas courtesy of wikipedia. In the early 1840s, several settlers came to the area around Plano. Several nearby facilities including a sawmill, gristmill and a store brought more people to the area. Mail service was established and after rejecting several names for the budding town (including naming it in honor of then-President Millard Fillmore), the locals suggested the name Plano, which they mistook for the Spanish word for "flat," a reference to the terrain of the area. The name was accepted by the Post Office and Plano Texas was born.

In 1872, the completion of the Houston and Texas Railroad helped the City of Plano Texas to grow, increasing the population to more than 500 by 1874.

In 1873, the City of Plano Texas officially incorporated.

In 1881, a fire raged through the central business district, destroying most of the buildings: 51 in all. However, the town was rebuilt and business again flourished through the 1880s.

In 1895 the Plano Independent School District PISD was formed.

Unlike many of the other Dallas Texas suburbs, which were closer to Dallas itself, the population of Plano initially grew slowly, reaching 1,304 in 1900 and increasing to 3,695 in 1960. By 1970, however, Plano began to feel some of the boom its neighbors experienced following World War II. A series of public works projects and a change in taxes that removed the farming community from the town helped to increase the overall population of Plano. In 1970, the population reached 17,872 and by 1980, the population had exploded to 72,000 people. Almost unbelievably the sewers, schools and street development kept easy pace with this massive increase largely due to Plano's flat topography, grid layout and excellent planning.

During the 1980s, many large corporations moved their headquarters to Plano TX, including JC Penney and Frito-Lay, which helped to further grow the city as more people desired to move closer to where they worked. By 1990, the population had reached 128,713 and now dwarfed the county seat of McKinney. In 1994, the city was recognized as an All-America City.

By 2000, the population nearly doubled again to 222,030, making it one of the largest suburbs in the Dallas area. However, the area's suburban sprawl has pushed beyond Plano and the city's population is stabilizing. The city of Plano Texas is completely locked in by other municipalities and cannot expand in area, and there is little undeveloped real estate remaining within Planos city limits. By 2005, its population was estimated to be 250,096.

While the City of Plano Texas has been known for many years as being an affluent suburb populated by wealthy citizens, this image has begun to change in recent years. Some of the older homes for sale and subdivisions in Plano TX are beginning to deteriorate as residents are moving to newer communities on the fringes of Plano, and a large influx of illegal aliens into the city's eastern half have changed the demographics of the city. Because of the scarcity of developable land in Plano TX, nearby cities such as Frisco TX and Allen TX are now attracting wealthy citizens and builders of luxury homes. While Plano TX continues to have extremely affluent citizens living in the western half of the city, today, the majority of Plano TX home owners are clearly members of the United States middle to upper-middle class. End of Wiki History.

The history of Plano Texas is found in a variety of sources.

If you are a Plano homeowner and would like to write a local perspective, please let us know.

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