THE COLONY, TEXAS. The Colony is by Lake Lewisville near the intersection of State Highway 121 and Farm Road 423, eight miles east of Lewisville, fifteen miles northeast of the Dallas-Fort Worth International Airportqv, and twenty-four miles north of downtown Dallas in southeastern Denton County. It is named after the Peters' colonyqv. The Colony is on the site of the Hedgcoxe War of 1852, in which armed settlers raided and burned the office of the Texas Emigration and Land Company. The community was established as a housing development by Fox and Jacobs, Incorporated, on some 3,000 acres in 1973. The few residents then occupying the land moved out, and the first twenty-seven new families moved into Fox and Jacobs's suburban, single-family homes in the fall of 1974. The developer established a municipal utilities district and secured services from the Lone Star Gas, Texas Power and Light, and Southwestern Bell Telephone companies. The residents organized a volunteer fire department. A homeowners' association initiated incorporation of The Colony in 1977, after negotiating a release of the land from the extraterritorial jurisdiction of the city of Frisco. In 1979 residents approved a charter that established a council-manager government with a seven-member city council. The Colony is served by two shopping centers, eight churches, and two newspapers, The Colony Courier and The Colony Leader. Lewisville Independent School District has built four elementary schools and a middle school in the town. In 1990 the population of The Colony was 22,113. The population reached 26,531 in 2000.
BIBLIOGRAPHY: Dallas Morning News, October 21, 1983. Dallas Times Herald, September 25, 1983. John Kincaid, John R. Todd, and James L. Danielson, "The Challenge of New Communities to Public Administration in Texas: The Colony as an Exemplary Case," Texas Journal of Political Studies 6 (Fall-Winter 1983 John Kincaid et al., Migration and Public Attitudes in a New Sunbelt City: The Colony, Texas, 1982 (North Texas State University Department of Political Science, 1983 "Texans Like The Colony," National Civic Review, December 1983.
