Thomas Chipman McRae, born in Mount Holly in Union County, Arkansas, became a courier for the Confederate Army at age twelve after his father's early death. He attended area schools and graduated from the Washington & Lee University law school in 1872, passed the Arkansas bar the following year, and opened a law practice in Rosston, the county seat of the then-new Nevada County. In 1874 he married Amelia White, and they had nine children. Before serving one term in the Arkansas House of Representatives, he represented Arkansas's third district in the United States Congress from 1885 to 1903. After retiring from Congress, he practiced law in Nevada County and purchased the Bank of Prescott in 1905. His peers elected him president of the Arkansas Bankers Association in 1909 and the Arkansas Bar Association in 1917-1918. Locally, he contributed land to the Prescott School District to build the district's first public school for black children. As Arkansas's twenty-sixth governor from 1921 to 1925, he served on a progressive platform, appointing women to civil offices, laying the groundwork for the state's modern highway system, and improving funding for education. After his time as governor, he continued to work in banking and law in Prescott, where he died in 1929.