Celebrating 60 Years
From Dormant Organization to the Heartbeat of the Tomball Community
By Matt Beardmore
In his July 8, 2015, message to Congress honoring the Tomball Chamber of Commerce’s 50th
anniversary, former-U.S. Representative Kevin Brady said: “Although the Chamber was not
formally incorporated until 1965, it was first organized in the 1920s when a group of local
businessmen identifying themselves as the chamber sent a telegram to a Marshall, Texas, doctor to
entice him to move to the area.”
Beyond this, any evidence of the chamber existing in the 1920s has been lost to time. Fortunately, the
history of Tomball and the 60 years that have now passed since the Greater Tomball Area Chamber of
Commerce incorporated on January 1, 1965, have been well-documented. And what we now have is a rich
history that includes details of how Harris County’s northernmost community has been transformed
by the railroad, oil, local officials’ love of Tomball, and the dedicated chamber of commerce
leaders who have transformed a “dormant organization” into the “heartbeat of the
community.”
This engraved message can be found on a plaque Pete Still received from the Tomball Chamber of Commerce
for serving as its president from 1964-66. Still passed away in 2011 at age 81. “During his
tenure, the biggest thing he accomplished was starting the then annual Christmas parade, complete with
huge inflatables,” Still’s son, Charlie, wrote in an email. “It was said to be longer
than the town and drew attention from all over. Estimated crowds were about 50,000 (at the time the
population was about 2,500). … I was 4-6 at the time, but it was magical. Tomball was a wonderful
Mayberry like town to be a kid in. I will always love that place!”
Many have come to love Tomball, Texas, since it was “first settled in the mid-1800s by German
immigrants who were attracted to the fertile land and abundant natural resources.” The area
experienced a boom in 1906, according to the Tomball Museum Center, as the Trinity and Brazos Valley
Railway ran through downtown, bringing people “in droves to this new train stop. Hotels, boarding
houses, saloons, and mercantile stores all began to spring up in the area.”
When the town incorporated in 1906, it was called Peck after a chief civil engineer on the T & BV
Railway. On December 2, 1907, the town was renamed Tomball after it was determined that Thomas Henry
Ball – an attorney with T & BV Railway and a former U.S. Representative and mayor of Huntsville,
TX – had more impact on the community as he convinced the T & BV Railway to extend through Peck.
“To us, Thomas Ball was the father of the Port of Houston – he went to Washington D.C. (as
a U.S. Representative) and got the Port of Houston started,” said Tomball Mayor Lori Klein Quinn,
a Tomball native.
“During 1907 to 1933, the people in the area were primarily involved in farming and ranching
activities,” Jean Alexander, former director of the Tomball Museum, told Community Impact in
2013. “The train was a step that eventually set the town into a position for more
growth—a school, hotels, a cotton gin and various things.”
According to the Texas Historical Association, Tomball rose to prominence in 1933 when drillers struck
oil southwest of town.
“When they discovered oil in 1933, Tomball became ‘Oiltown USA,’” Klein Quinn
said. “(Humble Oil & Refining Company, which is now Exxon) said, ‘let us drill in the town
and we will give you free gas,’ so we all grew up with heated swimming pools and free gas in the
home until they sold their oil leases to another company.”
Tomball continued to grow and prosper, and by the mid-20th century, it had become a thriving center of
commerce and industry, according to VisitTomball.com.
Although we know the Tomball Chamber became a “dormant organization” in the early- to
mid-1960s, the trajectory of the organization and its impact on the community changed with Pete Still
and Doris Johnson, the chamber’s manager from 1965-1972, leading the way.
“Doris Johnson was our trailblazer,” said Bruce Hillegeist, Tomball Chamber President and
CEO. “Under Pete Still’s encouragement, Doris took her idea of having a huge holiday parade,
as well as a Miss Tomball pageant, and made it happen. She was the driving force behind two events that
we still hold today, and that our community holds near and dear to their hearts.”
Johnson passed away in 2019 at the age of 87, but her legacy lives on. The Holiday Parade currently has
more than 160 entries with approximately 40,000 attendees enjoying the festivities, while a crown has
been placed on Miss Tomball since December 1966.
Hillegeist and Klein Quinn (Miss Tomball, 1972) also credit Diane Holland – the first female
president of the Texas Chamber of Commerce Executives – for her contributions to the
chamber’s (and the community’s) growth. “Diane was the original chamber director I
worked with when I moved back to Tomball (after going away to school and working at various CPA
firms),” Klein Quinn said of Holland, who passed away in 2016. “She loved this city.”
“Diane used the momentum from Doris to really engage the community, as well as have Tomball
recognized regionally and at the state level. She really led the way for our community to shine,”
added Hillegeist of Holland, whose work with the Tomball Chamber spanned 21 years starting in 1972.
Hillegeist has taken the chamber to even greater heights since taking over in 1994 following a 13-year
banking career. Although he shared during a 2011 interview with the Houston Chronicle that his
introductory week on the job – which happened to coincide with the week leading up to
Tomball’s annual Holiday Parade – was the best and worst week of his life as there was so
much to learn, the Tomball native and 1978 Mr. Tomball at Tomball High School feels blessed to have
learned so much about himself and the town he will always call home.
“The community of Tomball is what people think of when they think of Americana,” Hillegeist
said. “We respect our past, honor the traditions created before our time, but love to discover all
the possibilities of our collective futures. I have come to love Tomball more and more, knowing that it
is unique and special, and those that move here are influenced by long-time residents who share the
Tomball values with newcomers.”
Klein Quinn, like Hillegeist, was born and raised in Tomball and attended Tomball High School. She
cannot say enough good about the chamber’s long-time president and Tomball’s favorite son:
“Bruce has taken this chamber to a different level,” Klein Quinn said. “His leadership
comes from his love of the Lord and that makes him the best kind of leader – he has a heart of
gold and he’s a strong Christian. His parents (Roy Hillegeist and Arleah Bruce Hillegeist, who
grew up in Tomball and met as young adults on Tomball’s Main Street) are smiling down in heaven
and are so proud of what he has accomplished.”
Under Hillegeist, winner of the 2019 Texas Chamber of Commerce Executives’ Marvin Hurley Award
— the highest honor a Texas chamber professional can receive – the chamber has grown from
221 members in 1994 to 850.
“I’ve seen the chamber grow big time,” said Dr. Roy Lazenby, a Tomball resident since
1978, the first president of Lone Star College-Tomball when it opened in 1988, the city’s Citizen
of the Year in 1991, and a Tomball City Council member from 2006-09. “When Bruce took over 30
years ago, he was a hometown product and everyone rallied around Bruce. He’s Mr. Tomball.
It’s been great to see Bruce take it and run with it so to speak. He’s done a fantastic job
bringing people together.”
Steven Vaughan, who moved to Tomball in 1969 and was instrumental in launching the Tomball Economic
Development Corporation 25 years later, served on the Tomball Chamber Board when Hillegeist was hired as
president.
“When we hired Bruce, he took hold,” said Vaughan, Tomball’s Citizen of the Year in
2017. “He’s a smart guy and he knows where the chamber needs to be. They’re also good
at selecting folks to work there.”
Hillegeist is also quick to deflect credit for the Tomball Chamber of Commerce’s impact on the
community.
“I cannot brag enough about the chamber staff and their contributions to the community and to
myself,” he said. “I have been fortunate enough to work with amazing people that I learned
from every day. The team I have in place now is a direct result of learning from my 30 years. I try my
best to adapt to what our members need, our community needs, and what I need. At this time, we have a
robust team that brings tenure and new perspectives to the table, and we truly trust each other, as well
as respect each other’s opinions and strengths. The synergy can be felt in our community, as well
as throughout the state and country.”
The Tomball chamber team includes Vice President Brandy Beyer, who started with the chamber in 2001,
Director of Communications Amy Mason, who has been with the chamber for nearly eight years, Membership
Development Director Alex Wellbrock, a chamber employee for more than three years, and Membership
Engagement Director Jason Brandolini, who joined the team last year.
Each has shared a special memory of their time with the chamber:
• For Beyer, what stands out is one of the first Parade of Lights. They promised that a lady
bug would be in the parade, so to make that happen, they decorated Bruce’s Jeep as a lady bug and
drove it in the parade.
• One of Mason’s most memorable moments was embracing the 80’s-themed
Chairman’s Ball and dressing as Guns N’ Roses frontman Axl Rose with a co-worker who dressed
as bandmate, Slash.
• What stands out for Wellbrock is the team having to adjust to Beyer’s recent absence
from the Tomball Holiday Parade and for them to make sure it went on with no issues, even though it was
one of the wettest and coldest parades in recent history.
• Brandolini has been impressed by witnessing all the behind-the-scenes work that goes into
the Tomball Holiday Parade and then seeing it all play out so seamlessly on the day of the event.
One of Hillegeist’s fondest memories in three decades with the chamber was “when the
Chamber and the Tomball Economic Development Corporation moved into the same building, allowing people
to have a one-stop shop for all their business needs.”
The TEDC, formed in November 1994 “after the citizens of Tomball voted to pass a ½ cent sales tax
dedicated to economic development,” shared office space with the Chamber since before the Chamber
purchased the building at 29201 Quinn Road in 2008. On October 25, 2024, the TEDC left Suite B, where
the Chamber’s office is currently located, and moved to Suite A in the same building, switching
office space with the Tomball Regional Health Foundation.
“We got to see all the behind-the-scenes work the chamber does that the community doesn’t
necessarily see,” said Kelly Violette, Executive Director of the TEDC. “They’re some
of the hardest working people I’ve ever worked with. Bruce is an awesome leader, but he has a
wonderful team that’s all doing their part. They live and breathe Tomball. That’s something
you don’t see in every chamber – plus the longevity of the staff. It helps when you
don’t have a lot of turnover that you can see in a number of different organizations.”
Violette, formerly the City Planner and Community Developer Coordinator with the City of Tomball, has
been in her current role since 2011. One of the TEDC’s most impactful projects during
Violette’s tenure was the purchase and development of the 99.5-acre Business & Technology Park,
which Violette told Community Impact in April 2023 had brought 568 jobs to Tomball since its
groundbreaking in May 2014.
Now that the development of the Business & Technology Park is complete with the June 2023 sale of the
final lot, the TEDC’s focus has shifted to developing and redeveloping Tomball’s Old Town.
To encourage quality investment in this area, the TEDC – as spelled out in its 2024-25 Strategic
Work Plan – is focused on partnering with the city on targeted infrastructure improvements,
planning and improving parking and pedestrian access, initiating the planning process for the First
Baptist Church Project (the TEDC purchased the church in April 2023 for approximately $4.6 million),
creating a project and financing plan for the redevelopment of the South Live Oak Business Park (which
the TEDC purchased in 2020), and promoting incentives and looking for additional ways to encourage
upgrades to Old Town properties.
The united efforts and strong partnership between the TEDC, the Chamber, and the City of Tomball
“appeals to developers and investors who are looking at putting their investments to work,”
Violette said. “What drives a lot of the relocation to Tomball is our school district, we have a
private school, and Lone Star College-Tomball. Another driver is our healthcare industry and VA clinic
and availability of all the support services. Another huge asset we have is the welcoming environment
people receive from the Chamber and EDC when they come here. We make sure we’re helping all the
businesses grow and be successful.”
To ensure that businesses are benefiting as much as possible from Chamber membership, the Tomball
Chamber of Commerce has made a priority over the last several years of achieving accreditations from the
U.S. Chamber of Commerce, “the world’s largest business organization.”
There are more than 7,000 chambers of commerce in the U.S., according to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce,
but as of November 2024, only 195 were accredited. Among those, just 151 – or 2% of the total
number of U.S. chambers – were 5-Star accredited. The Greater Tomball Area Chamber of Commerce
joined that exclusive group in 2023 after earning 4-Star status in 2019 and 3-Star accreditation in
2016.
“This is a chamber committed to consistent and measurable improvement over time,” said
Lindsey Cates, Senior Manager of Communications and Strategy, at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.
To earn the 5-Star accreditation in 2023, there were 10 areas of focus that the chamber was required to
submit information on to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, including financial plans, HR guidelines, a
technology plan and a disaster plan, which the chamber had not yet developed. Denise Davis, former
Chairman of the Greater Tomball Area Chamber of Commerce and current Chair of the chamber’s
Women’s Committee, along with Beyer, leveraged their years of chamber experience and led the
submission process for all three of the chamber’s accreditations.
“It was a labor-intensive process for us – there were a lot of pieces we had to develop
from scratch and we had to meet with chamber members and the chamber’s board during the
accreditation process,” said Davis, owner of Tomball-based TWFG Denise Davis Insurance.
“Earning the 5-Star accreditation really shows the chamber of commerce really persevered and was
very persistent about making sure that they’re providing the highest level of service and
accommodation to our business members. It would have been easy to just do what we’ve been doing,
but the chamber felt strongly it wanted to take it to the next level.”
So what does the future hold for the Greater Tomball Area Chamber of Commerce? In 2025, it will be a
year of celebrating the Chamber’s 60th anniversary and all who have made it the impactful
organization it is today. At its first meeting of the year, the Chamber will unveil its new logo and
highlight historical Chamber moments throughout the years. The Chamber is also planning on bringing
together all chamber members, past and present, for a “family reunion” in June. Many events
in 2025 will be themed around it’s 60-year milestone.
“The Tomball Chamber really is second to none,” said Ross Winkler, Director of Government &
Public Affairs at Winkler Public Relations and a new Tomball Chamber of Commerce Board member.
“We’re members of several chambers, and I can tell you every chamber I know in the region
looks to Tomball as the shining light or the model for how a chamber should be run. It’s all
because of the staff there. Bruce’s leadership and the team he’s put together. You can tell
how much they love Tomball. The Tomball Chamber is the heartbeat of the community – they have a
hand in so many things.”
