Today, the name Gleannloch Farms represents a modern master-planned community of nearly 3,200 homes, interwoven with miles of roads and sidewalks, a golf course, three recreation centers with pools and sports facilities, playgrounds, churches, schools, and businesses, but a little over 70 years ago, Gleannloch Farms was a very different place, a special place filled with a love of the open land and a great passion for exceptional and charismatic horses.
Brief history of Gleannloch Farms
Owned by legendary Texas oilman, banker, real estate investor, and farmer, Douglas B. Marshall and his equally famous wife and socialite Margaret Cullen Marshall, daughter and heir of the “King of the Wildcatters” and philanthropist Hugh Roy Cullen, the Gleannloch Farms property was acquired sometime in the mid-1940s.
It was in the 1950s when the Marshall Family commenced their quest to acquire and eventually import horses directly from the Middle East to their beautiful horse breeding farm in Spring, Texas. One of the more famous of the Gleannloch Farms stallions was *Morafic, who is immortalized in a statue at the intersection of Champion Forest Drive and Spring-Cypress Road in Spring, Texas (just outside the one of the main entrances to today’s community).
Gleannloch Farms has many famous moments to its credit, including a site location clip in the 1996 movie “Tin Cup” starring Kevin Costner and Renee Russo. Celebrities such as entertainer Wayne Newton, singer Dale Evans and actor Michael Ansara rode Gleannloch’s Arabians in the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo, and actors Kenny Rogers and Patrick Swayze purchased Gleannloch horses to expand their stock. Douglas Marshall himself used to chair the Houston Livestock Show & Rodeo (1958-1960), showcasing his beautiful Gleannloch Farms horses to the masses. Even U.S. Presidents had horses bred and raised from Gleannloch Farms, including Lyndon B. Johnson.
Gleannloch Farms then, as it is now, is a beautiful and serene oasis located in the north west area of Harris County. The community still has some of the original white wood clad stables, offices, and barn in use today.
The residents of Gleannloch Farms are proud to call this beautiful community home. Local history with modern flair. Simply a great place to live and raise a family.
