The Church of Jesus Christ of the latter Day Saints organized the Big Horn Colonization Company in 1900 to construct the Sidon Canal. That same year the towns of Byron, Cowley, and Lovell were laid out as part of the colonization effort.
Cowley was named after Mathias Cowley, a Mormon apostle.
The Big Horn Academy opened in 1911 as a preparatory school. It moved into new sandstone buildings in 1917 and was converted to Cowley High School in 1924.
