Lewisville was formally incorporated after a January 15, 1925, election, but the settlement as a community actually began about 80 years earlier.
In the 1840s, the Republic of Texas gave a grant to the Texas Emigration and Land Company to bring 600 families to what is now Denton County. Each family was to receive 640 acres of land, bachelors receiving 320 acres. By 1846, the necessary families had arrived, and Denton County was formed. The first settlers to the Lewisville area were the families of John and Augustus King, who migrated to the area in 1844. Following their lead, John and James Holford brought several families from Platt, Missouri and settled on the western part of the King land.
Many of the original “new” buildings were located very near the railroad (later the MKT and now the Union Pacific), but flooding on the Elm Fork of the Trinity River caused those establishments to be moved uphill and west to the area of Mill and Main Streets. A grist mill, constructed near the location of today’s Sonic Drive In, firmly anchored the settlement in the new location. By the time of the incorporation election in 1925, the Lewisville community had grown to a population of about 850 residents and was served by five cotton gins and two saloons.
The January 1925 incorporation election marked the beginning of the municipality as we now know it, with a vote of 109-92. County Judge Jackson certified the election of the town’s mayor and aldermen March 10, and the first official town meeting was held March 16, 1925. The first ordinances regulated medicine shows and set speed limits for automobiles at 18 mph. The taxable value of property in the newly incorporated town was $779,086.
