Each edition grades its towns against each other only.
Photo: Billy Hathorn. Original uploader was Billy Hathorn at en.wikipedia · CC BY-SA 3.0More historic than 50% of U.S. towns · #137 of 642 in Texas. What drives it
Most of Bay City was built recently: 3% of its homes predate 1940 and the median home dates from 1979. 6 places in town are on the National Register, among them a historic district with 83 buildings. Below: 2 old photos and papers, maps from 1907 on, and the census since 1910.
The Bay City post office opened in 1894, the earliest record of the town by name.
More historic than 50% of U.S. towns, on its age, its old homes and the National Register.
On its age, its old homes and the National Register, Bay City is more historic than 50% of U.S. towns, #137 of 642 in Texas. Its National Register listings hold the grade up; its share of homes from before 1940 pulls it down.
Few Texas towns list much on the Register (a typical Texas town has 0.0 per 10,000 residents, the U.S. 2.4), so Bay City’s 49.1 sits above most of its state (94% of Texas towns have fewer) while its 87 historic buildings outnumber those of 89% of U.S. towns.
Founding year: the first post office (other dates in Quick answers). Homes: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register: National Park Service, May 2026 list; each listing counted once (boundary changes and added documentation belong to their listing), and a historic district counts its contributing buildings. How TownRatings grades history →
Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.
The first neighbors to add old photos shape how Bay City’s history is told.
The country’s official list of buildings and places worth saving.
National Park Service, National Register of Historic Places. Photos from Wikimedia Commons, credited on each place’s page.
Fire insurance maps drew every building, what it was made of and what it was used for, so insurers could price the risk of fire. Pick a year, then a sheet.
1907Sheet 1 of 5Sanborn Map Company, via the Library of Congress. Editions published in 1930 or earlier, which are in the public domain.
From Wikipedia’s history of Bay City.
Bay City was incorporated in 1894 as the county seat, as it was in the center of Matagorda County. The Bay City Town Company was founded by David Swickheimer in partnership with G. M. Magill, N. M. Vogelsang, and Nicholas King.
Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.
Woven from the archive, old maps, post office records, the National Register and the people born here.
In the archiveBirds eye view, Bay City, Tex., Nov. 26, 1912BuiltMatagorda County Monument is built
On the mapFirst mapped by the U.S. Geological SurveyOne decade in the archive so far: the 1910s. Scroll each row; tap a photo for its story.
Every edition of the U.S. Geological Survey’s map of Bay City. Tap a year, or press play to watch the town change.
U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (public domain), via Esri’s collection of the scans. The red ring marks the center of Bay City.
No then-and-now pairs yet. Take a photo from the same spot as an old one and they appear here side by side.
Find the spot, match the angle, and add your photo. It becomes the first then-and-now pair on Bay City’s page.
Retake this view · +15Between 3,156 and 18,667 people in every census since 1910.
12 censuses, 1910–2020.
U.S. Census Bureau decennial counts, from the census table on Bay City’s Wikipedia page.
Writers, athletes, leaders and more, ranked by how widely they’re known.
Each neighbor’s History grade, on the same three inputs.
The Bay City post office opened in 1894, the earliest record of the town by name (U.S. post office records).
Bay City is more historic than 50% of U.S. towns, #137 of 642 in Texas. The History grade combines the town’s founding era, the share of homes built before 1940 and its National Register listings. It’s a character grade, so it isn’t part of the overall grade. How it works.
6 listings: 4 buildings, among them the Bay City USO Building (listed 2006, the first), 1 historic district, the South Side Residential Historic District, with 83 contributing buildings, and 1 object. 87 historic buildings in all.
3% of Bay City’s homes were built before 1940 (Census estimate, ±1.0 points), against a typical 1.6% for a Texas town; the median home was built in 1979.
What the archives can’t tell you, neighbors can.
Founding dates: Wikidata, Wikipedia, the U.S. post office records of Blevins & Helbock (CC0) and the Census. Homes by year built: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register of Historic Places: National Park Service (list of May 22, 2026). Old photos, postcards and papers: Wikimedia Commons, the Library of Congress and other public archives, credited on each item’s page. Maps: U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (via Esri) and Sanborn fire-insurance maps (Library of Congress). History text and census tables: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0). Places that used to be: USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021).
From Wikimedia Commons (5), Wikidata (1), the National Register of Historic Places (6), Wikipedia, Wikidata and Wikipedia for famous people, U.S. Geological Survey historical maps, U.S. Census counts (via Wikipedia), the US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock), the USGS Geographic Names Information System and Sanborn fire insurance maps (Library of Congress). Archive images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.
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