Garrett, Texas: Fifteen Trains a Day

In the late eighteen seventies Garrett became the junction where the Waxahachie Tap Road met the Houston and Texas Central Railway, and for decades that made it one of the busiest small stops in Ellis County. At its peak, fifteen passenger trains a day rolled through. The Waxahachie Tap itself had been chartered in January eighteen seventy-five when local businessmen decided the county seat needed a direct rail connection, and construction was completed by September eighteen seventy-nine, funneling passengers and freight through Garrett.

The brothers Claiborne and William Garrett had donated the land for the junction, and the station took their name. By the early nineteen fifties regular rail service ended, and Garrett settled back into the rural quiet it holds today.