Sam Houston Industrial and Training School
Huntsville, Walker County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Legislated after the close of the Civil War, the Texas Constitution of 1866 provided for a public school system supported by funds derived from property taxes; monies collected from African Americans would go to schools for their children. Although the law continued to change during the next decades, the primary providers of African American education were the Freedmen's Bureau, churches, missionary associations and philanthropists. Samuel W. Houston (1864-1945) was born in Huntsville to Joshua and Sylvester Houston. His father was a slave and personal bodyguard of former Texas President Sam Houston. His family believed strongly in education, and he earned degrees from the Hampton Institute in Virginia, Atlanta University in Georgia and Howard University in Washington, D.C. He returned to Huntsville in 1900 and established a newspaper. He then taught in Grimes County and at the Huntsville Community School before establishing a school circa 1906 near here in what was the Galilee community. The Sam Houston Industrial and Training School began in the Galilee Methodist Church, which Houston rented for the classes. He soon added teachers and programs, offering vocational curriculum as well as the arts and humanities. Trustees built the first schoolhouse in 1914 and continued to add facilities, including dormitories and workshops. By 1930, the school served hundreds of students from around the state. That year, the Sam Houston school merged into the Huntsville Colored School, which became Sam Houston High School. It closed in 1968 due to integration. The foundation set by Houston and other early educators ensured the education of generations of African American students in the 20th century. (2005)
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Born in Huntsville in 1864 to enslaved parents, Samuel W. Houston earned degrees from Hampton, Atlanta University, and Howard before returning home to build schools for African American children in an era when the state funneled only Black-paid taxes toward their education. Around 1906 he opened classes in the rented Galilee Methodist Church, and the Sam Houston Industrial and Training School grew to serve hundreds of students statewide with vocational and academic programs. Merged into the Huntsville school system by 1930, it became Sam Houston High School and endured until integration in 1968.
Why it matters
Houston's school stands as a monument to Black self-determination in education during the harsh decades of segregation, when Freedmen's Bureau roots and community effort together secured schooling for generations denied it.
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Related people
- · Samuel W. Houston
- · Joshua Houston
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
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Rogersville is Huntsville's oldest African-American neighborhood, born when former mayor Micajah Rogers began selling tracts to freed people in 1866 — among the buyers, Sam Houston's former body servant Joshua Houston. Freedpeople here built homes, churches, and businesses from blacksmith shops to cafes, and turned their churches into schools when public ones were denied. It became the heart of Huntsville's Black community and the home of its annual Juneteenth celebration.
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