A school for African American students in Del Rio was organized as early as 1901 and closed in the 1920s. Del Rio ISD later used part of a 1929-30 bond package to build a one-room stucco exterior school on Ware Street. First known as Brackenridge, it had few books or equipment and often used materials discarded from other schools. Each grade typically included only a few students. In the 1950s, the faculty consisted of one principal and three teachers, and a building moved from Laughlin Air Force Base was divided into junior and senior high grades. After Principal W. H. Tarver died, the school was renamed in his honor, and it closed in 1957 with the end of segregation.