The Cockayne farmhouse was built by Bennett Cockayne around 1850. His son Samuel A.J. Cockayne, born in 1841, became renowned as a sheep breeder, raising purebred, fine-wooled American Merino sheep in Marshall County. Samuel's wife Hannah dubbed the farm Glendale, and it gave Glen Dale its name when the town was incorporated in 1924. Samuel gained prominence when he won first prize at the 1876 Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia for the quality of wool produced on his farm. In 1879, he helped form the Wool Growers and Sheep Breeders Association in the state and served as treasurer. In 1965, much of the farm was sold to make way for John Marshall High School, and the farmhouse is on the National Register of Historic Places.