Fort Worth was established on November 14, 1849 and incorporated in 1874. In 1875, the Dallas Herald published an article by a former Fort Worth lawyer, Robert E. Cowart, who wrote that the decimation of Fort Worth’s population, caused by the economic disaster and hard winter of 1873, had dealt a severe blow to the cattle industry.
Cowart said that Fort Worth was so slow that he saw a panther asleep in the street by the courthouse. Although an intended insult, the name Panther City was enthusiastically embraced when in 1876 Fort Worth recovered economically. Many businesses and organizations continue to use Panther in their name. A panther is set at the top of the police department badges.
The city was named after William J. Worth. It is the fifth-largest city in the U.S. state of Texas and the 13th-largest city in the United States. It is the county seat of Tarrant County. USS Fort Worth (LCS-3) is the first ship of the United States Navy named after the city.
Fort Worth has historically been a center of the Texas Longhorn cattle trade. It still embraces its Western heritage and traditional architecture and design. Fort Worth has many nicknames: Cowtown, Panther City, Funkytown, Queen City of the Prairie. Its mottos are: “Where the West begins”; “Crossroads of Cowboys & Culture”.