Venus

Venus, formerly known as Gossip, is on State Highway 67 some twenty miles east of Cleburne in eastern Johnson County. Though a number of families settled in the area in the late 1850s, a community did not develop there until the late 1880s. At that time J. C. Smyth purchased eighty acres in an abandoned cornfield and laid off town lots. He named the new community Venus in honor of the daughter of a local physician. In 1888 a post office branch opened, and by 1890 Venus had ten residents and was at the junction of the International-Great Northern and the Gulf, Colorado and Santa Fe railroads. By the mid-1890s Venus was one of the most prosperous towns in Johnson County, reporting thirteen businesses, thirty-one houses, a number of churches, a grade school, and Burnetta College. During the next decade three banks opened, a weekly newspaper named the Venus Express began, and the town voted to incorporate (1903