Port Mansfield, Texas

Until 1948, the little-used highway from Raymondville to a point on Laguna Madre that was called Redfish Bay was traveled by occasional fishermen going to deserted beaches. No community marked the road's end at the water's edge. People of Willacy County, employing their own financing, set about creating a port. They built wharves, docks and a turning basin. They laid out a townsite, and called it Port Mansfield. A ship channel was completed in 1962, slicing across the shallow Laguna Madre, through Padre Island into the deep waters of the Gulf of Mexico.

Port Mansfield's surrounding salt flats and small spoil islands support an amazing variety of resident and migratory birds. The nearby Laguna Madre area is well-known among bird watchers. The town is also home to U.S. Weather Bureau and U.S. Coast Guard Stations.