Horseshoe Bend, Texas is located approximately 12 miles south of Weatherford in southern Parker County. The community sits in a horseshoe-shaped bend along the Brazos River. 

Once known as Tin Top, Texas settled in the mid-1880s it was first called Smith after an early settler, and later, Irby, after local rancher Benjamin F. Irby. The name Tin Top derived from a cotton gin built there in 1909; it had a galvanized-metal roof that could be seen for miles. The community lay dormant until 1949, when its few scattered residents combined with those of nearby Balch, Horse Shoe Bend, and Hightower under the name Tin Top; they built a community center and reestablished churches. From 1980 through 1990 the community reported a population of twenty-five. The Tin Top Suspension Bridge, which spans the Brazos River, is listed in the National Register of Historic Places. 

Brazos River also called the Río de los Brazos de Dios (translated as "The River of the Arms of God") by early Spanish explorers, is the 11th-longest river in the United States at 1,280 miles (2,060 km) from its headwater source at the head of Blackwater Draw, Roosevelt County, New Mexico to its mouth at the Gulf of Mexico with a 45,000-square-mile (116,000 km2) drainage basin. Being one of Texas' largest rivers, it is sometimes used to mark the boundary between East Texas and West Texas.

The river is closely associated with Texas history, particularly the Austin settlement and Texas Revolution eras. Today major Texas institutions such as Texas Tech University, Baylor University, and Texas A&M University are located close to the river's basin, as are parts of metropolitan Houston.