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ABOUT US :: HISTORY
How did the Water
Utilities Department get its start?
 In
1841, U.S. Sergeant Major Jonathan Bird was ordered by General Edward
H.
Tarrant to set up the first fort on the West Fork of the Trinity
River. Soon after arriving, his expedition of 40 volunteers became
embroiled in the Battle of Village Creek with the Comanche Indians.
Several years later a treaty was signed between the Indians and the
settlement somewhere in the vicinity of Bird's fort, located one mile
north of the Trinity River on the east side of Highway 157. After the
treaty was signed, Major Bird encouraged his companions to settle
there, believing that the area could be made habitable.
Then in 1846, Colonel Middleton Tate
Johnson, who was elected Captain of the Company of Rangers, liked the
area so well that he decided to settle here permanently and helped
develop the area that became known as Johnson Station, located near
Matlock Road, between Arkansas Lane and Mayfield Road.
A major attraction for early settlers
was the quantity of water offered by Village Creek. Other settlers
came to develop what later became Arlington and by 1894 the population
had grown to 900 residents, which increased the demand for water, thus
the first Arlington Water Works was established.
The Water Utilities Department
currently operates and maintains two water treatment plants. The
original plant was named Pierce Burch (PB) after two long-term Water
Utilities employees. Over the years, the plant has been expanded
from its original capacity of 6 million gallons per day (MGD) to its
current capacity of 100 MGD.
In 1989, the City's second water
treatment plant, Southwest, was placed in service. The plant was
renamed the John F. Kubala (JFK) Water Treatment Plant in 1997, after
the City's first Director of Utilities. The plant's original
capacity was 32 MGD but in 2001-2002 it was expanded to 65 MGD to meet
the increasing water demand in south Arlington.
To learn more historical facts about Arlington visit
our History of Arlington page.
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