At the turn of the 20th century, Texas promoted the sale of public school lands to encourage settlement in rural areas, and by 1901 a community had developed in southeastern Ochiltree County between Ochiltree, then the county seat, and Glazier, the nearest railroad point. Among the first settlers were R. E. Wamble and his wife, Emma Jane Taylor, and because of its location on the Ochiltree-Glazier road the community was originally called Half-Way. Earlier cattle ranch and wagon freighter trails formed the local transportation network. In 1906 William F. Taylor and his wife, Helen Short, arrived, and the next year they donated one acre to Ochiltree County for Ridge School. Other early settlers included the Gerhart, Good, Norris, and Westerfield families. In the 1910s the D-C-D highway from Dallas to Canadian to Denver incorporated the half-way section of the Ochiltree-Glazier road, and this stretch later became FM281. Frank L. Hamilton and his wife, Mary Lucy, moved onto section 209 in 1919 and opened a general store with two gas pumps as the automobile rapidly replaced the horse and buggy. On Dec. 21, 1920, they applied for a post office named Alton, but because that name was already in use, the community took the name Notla, Alton spelled backward. Mary served as postmaster for 22 years. In 1924 Notla school, built on the south side of the D-C-D highway, replaced Ridge School as the center of the community, and over the years it hosted many social and group events, including nondenominational Sunday school and church services. The post office closed in 1944, the school had merged with Perryton in 1939, and the school building burned in 1966. Residents and descendants recall the spirit of many generations there today.