COURTNEY, TEXAS (Martin County). Courtney is in south central Martin County on land that had previously served as headquarters of the Christopher C. Slaughter ranch. The community was named for John H. Courtney, who in 1889 began farming there and who donated land for a school, which opened in 1907. A rural school district was organized in 1916, and Courtney became an independent school district in 1927. In 1949 the Badgett school was consolidated with that of Courtney, and in the 1950s the Courtney and Stanton schools were consolidated. Baptists and Methodists joined to build a union church, known as the Courtney Tabernacle, in 1924. The Baptists built a new building in 1941, and the Methodists disbanded in 1954. Church of Christ and Primitive Baptist congregations also met in Courtney. The 1984 county highway map showed a church at Courtney.
BIBLIOGRAPHY: Vernen Liles, Pioneering on the Plains: The History of Martin County, Texas (M.A. thesis, University of Texas, 1953). Martin County Historical Commission, Martin County, Texas (Dallas: Taylor, 1979).
