Site of Valley View School
Colorado City, Mitchell County, Texas
Marker Inscription
In 1905 nine men from the Lone Wolf Valley adopted plans for a community school. Named Valley View by S.H. Hart, it began under the direction of eighteen-year-old Aury Williams, the first teacher. Edmond Seymour donated land at this site for a one-room schoolhouse, constructed by W.D. McCarley, T.J. Coffee, A.J. Compton, J.B. Cranfill, J.H.T. Johnson, Billie Seymour and Willie Seymour. The building was also used as a community center. The Valley View School continued to serve the surrounding rural area until 1942, when it was consolidated with the Loraine District. (1982)
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
In 1905 nine men of the Lone Wolf Valley agreed to build a community school, naming it Valley View and hiring an eighteen-year-old, Aury Williams, as its first teacher. Neighbors donated the land and raised the one-room schoolhouse by hand, using it as a community center as well. It served the surrounding ranch country until 1942, when consolidation into the Loraine District ended the era of the rural one-room school.
Why it matters
The one-room schoolhouse was the beating heart of countless rural American communities, and its consolidation marks the quiet passing of a whole way of frontier life.
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Related people
- · Aury Williams
- · Edmond Seymour
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Lone Wolf Community
Hermleigh, TX
Named for the Kiowa chief Lone Wolf, whose people ranged across this stretch of West Texas until the 1870s, this community took root when settler John Mahoney donated land for a cemetery and school. A one-room schoolhouse rose in 1901, doubling as a church, and a store, post office, and scattered farms soon followed. The little settlement gradually faded as its school consolidated, but its pioneer cemetery, with graves dating to 1892, still serves area families.
Site of Westbrook School and Church
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Moore School
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First Baptist Church
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This West Texas congregation formed in 1892, before the town of Loraine had even sold its lots, worshiping in the local schoolhouse for fourteen years. When members finally built in brick, they reused salvaged material from the old Colorado City Salt Works boiler building for the inner walls—a frugal, resourceful touch typical of frontier communities.