Born in Kentucky, Josiah Hart Jackson came to Texas in 1839. In the 1850s he opened Jackson's Store, 1 mi. northeast of here, helping start "Cow Hill," a village with a race track, blacksmith shop, and other stores. He became postmaster and renamed the place Ashland in 1873, but moved the post office here to Commerce at the city's birth. He married Sarah A. Maddox in 1841 and had 6 children; after her death, he married Elvira Jernigan Hart.