| Cheek
is on State
Highway 124
seven miles
southwest of
Beaumont in
central
Jefferson
County. In
1906 it was
laid out by
and named for
J. R. Cheek.
The community
was on the
Gulf and
Interstate
Railway and
was inhabited
largely by
rice farmers
who used the
Beaumont
Irrigating
Company's
canal, which
cut through
Cheek and
irrigated the
surrounding
farms. By 1925
Cheek's
population was
estimated to
be forty.
Although Cheek
remained an
identifiable
community, its
proximity to
Beaumont
probably
reduced the
number of
services
available at
the site. Its
post office
was
discontinued
in 1928. The
Cheek Common
School
District,
organized in
1907 and
bolstered by
the
construction
in 1939 of a
new school
building by
the Public
Works
Administration
(see
GREAT
DEPRESSION),
was
consolidated
with the South
Park
Independent
School
District of
Beaumont in
1951. By the
1970s a large
Goodyear
chemical plant
was nearby.
The community
reported a
population of
sixty-two in
1990 and again
in 2000.
Robert Wooster
- Handbook
of Texas
Online,
s.v. ","
http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/CC/hnc51.html (accessed
March 3,
2008).
(NOTE: "s.v."
stands for sub
verbo, "under
the word.")
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