Rural Shade

The Handbook of Texas credits Hugh and Washington Ingram with settling Rural Shade in 1850 and says James Ingram, one of Hugh's sons, built the area's first steam-powered gristmill around 1870. By 1885 the community had a blacksmith shop, a sawmill, three gristmills, three general stores and four cotton gins, with an estimated seventy-five residents. Two schools enrolled 145 pupils in 1906. After World War II the school merged with Kerens, the stores closed, and by the mid-1960s only a church and scattered houses remained.

What the plaque says

Rural Shade As early as 1850 there were several families living in the area near the Wildcat Ferry on the Trinity River. In 1852 a gravel road designed to be the best route from Corsicana to the Wildcat Ferry ran directly through this community. In 1858 Washington Ingram became the first postmaster of Rural Shade. A school district was created in 1867. In 1888, Rural Shade Baptist Church of Christ was established and land was deeded to the community for a school and a church to be shared by the Methodist Episcopal, Christian, and primitive and missionary Baptist churches. Many early settlers were farmers living in log cabins with dirt floors. By the turn of the century there were several fine large homes, most still surrounded by barns filled with livestock. In 1917 church membership was 237. School enrollment had reached 305 pupils by 1929. Rural free delivery began in 1912; Rural Shade continued to grow until World War II, when many young people departed for cities and did not return. In 1953 a community center was created in the school building on this site. Ex-students reunited each July through the 20th century. (1998)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Petroleum Industry Park — 19 mi
  The pipes and drilling tower mark where a city water well struck oil on June 9, 1894, the start of the first Texas field to produce oil and gas in important quantities.
• Blind Lemon Memorial Cemetery — 26 mi
  The Freestone County grave of the Texas blues singer Blind Lemon Jefferson, who recorded for Paramount in Chicago from 1926 and died there in December 1929.

More markers nearby

• Kerens Presbyterian Church — 7.5 mi
• Kerens — 7.7 mi
• Josiah Martin Daniel — 7.7 mi
• Eureka Cemetery — 7.9 mi