This Way? That Way? Any Way? ... Here's Why Street Names in Lake Jackson, Texas, are Bonkers
Visit Lake Jackson, Texas, and you'll most likely lose your way for a while.
The small town of 27,000 residents, located 50 miles south of Houston, is famous for having strange street names. "We have This Way, That Way, Any Way, Circle Way, Parking Way, Winding Way and we have His Way, which runs behind a church," said longtime city manager Bill Yenne to NBC News.
So how did Lake Jackson got such strange street names?
It all began with town planner Alben B. Dow, the son of Dow Chemical founder Herbert Henry Dow. When the senior Dow wanted to create a company town where his employees could live and work, he asked his architect son to design the town.
The younger Dow liked curved streets, so he designed Lake Jackson, Texas to have roads arranged in a concentric circle pattern rather than grids commonly found in most downtowns. He also resisted street names common to other cities, like First street and Main street.
According to Ande Larsen of the Lake Jackson Museum, Dow asked his secretary E.D. Collerain about what to name the curving streets, and she replied "Don’t ask me. You’ve got all these streets going this way and that way. I don’t know what you’re going to call them." To which, Dow replied, "‘Perfect! This’ll be That Way and that will be This Way!"
Image: Lake Jackson Historical
Google Map of Lake Jackson, Texas.