North Richland Hills

North Richland Hills is on State highways 26, 183, and 820, eight miles west of the Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport and eight miles northeast of downtown Fort Worth in northeastern Tarrant County. The town is part of the Fort Worth-Arlington Metropolitan Statistical Area. The area was agricultural until 1950, when Clarence Jones developed his farm into a residential area and named it North Richland Hills, in imitation of an adjacent successful development to the south. The city was incorporated by election on April 25, 1953. During the 1980s North Richland Hills had a broad business base, manufacturing everything from computers (Tandy Advanced Products) to mattresses (Ohio Sealy). Other businesses included Walker Construction Company, Sanger Harris (Foley's retail), Graham Magnetics (magnetic tape), Bates Containers, Allied Northeast Bank, Interfirst Bank, and the Bank of North Texas. The Mid-Cities Daily News and the North Hills News were the local papers. In 1990 the Birdville Independent School District had six elementary schools, one junior high, and one senior high in North Richland Hills. In addition, there were several denominational schools, and twenty-two churches representing ten faiths. The city boundary ran through the northeast campus of Tarrant County Junior College. A municipal complex built in 1960 and expanded in 1987 housed the police department, the water department, and the city administration. A second civic center of 87,000 square feet housed the city library and the Parks and Recreation Department; the theater in the building was home to the North East Fine Arts League. In 1958 North Richland Hills had an estimated population of 7,000. Its population increased steadily, until by 1970 it was estimated at 15,735. In 1978 the population was 23,265, and by 1990 it had risen to 38,959. In the early 1990s North Richland Hills had a council-manager form of city government. By 2000 the population reached 55,635.