Along with providing badly needed education facilities to the Upper Cumberland's small African-American population, the school published the Christian Echo, a Church of Christ newsletter circulated nationwide.

In spite of early financial struggles, the school, with the help of Nashville minister David Lipscomb and philanthropist A. M. Burton, managed to survive until 1959.

Du Bois wrote of the primitive conditions of a black schoolhouse at nearby Alexandria, where he taught class while a student at Fisk University in the 1880s.

In late 1909, Bowser opened what was initially known as the Putnam County Normal and Industrial Orphanage at Silver Point.

Womack, Campbell, and another Church of Christ official named Henry Clay served as the school's first board of directors.

The top of the south wall contains a block of concrete which may have at one time held a stone inscribed with the name of the church or school.

[2] The church's interior follows a basic floor plan, with two sets of pews divided by a central aisle leading to the pulpit.

In accordance with the congregation's understanding of Scripture that musical instruments are not authorized by the New Testament for use in worship, there is no piano or organ to be found.