Lakeview

Lakeview is southeast of State highways 87 and 347, twenty miles southeast of Beaumont in eastern Jefferson County. It overlooks Sabine Lake. Artesian wells at the site provided water shipped up the Neches River to Beaumont during the latter nineteenth century. In 1928 the Gist Realty Company platted the Lakeview addition to Port Arthur. In 1938 Lakeview voters incorporated their residential community by a 51–13 margin. In the early 1940s the city had 852 residents. Impelled by wartime expansion of Jefferson County industries, the population jumped to 3,083 in 1950. Ten years later the figure reached 3,849, and during the mid-1970s it fell slightly to 3,597. Port Arthur attempted to annex the residential community in 1929 but was blocked by a court injunction. By 1980, however, Lakeview had been merged with its larger urban neighbor.