“The 1923 Garland Community School Teacherage is named after the former enslaved families that established the community shortly after emancipation in the years 1865-1870. Prior to the Civil War, the land on which the house stands belonged to John Garland, a plantation owner from Madison County, Tennessee. Garland came to Red River County, Texas (which includes what is now Bowie County) in the late 1850’s to pursue better farming opportunities. John Garland earned a reputation as a relatively liberal slave master in that he kept families intact and circumvented existing Texas laws by allowing some of his slaves to learn to read and write. According to the family oral history, he fathered a child in Tennessee named Ruth by a Cherokee Indian woman. Upon the death of Ruth’s mother, she was brought into the family home and raised. Ruth later married John Garland’s slave and carriage driver, James. When John Garland came to Texas he brought with him his family and slaves, including Ruth, her husband, James, and their children, who became the nucleus of the African American community named Garland. In 1865, John Garland deeded the least valuable land to the newly freed men and women. They immediately began to cultivate the land and set up the essentials of a community. By 1875 they had established a school, two churches, a store and a post office.”