Ater Cemetery

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'll pass it along just the same. Out in Coryell County, there's a patch of ground that's been keepin' secrets since before most of Texas knew what it wanted to be. The place started out with a name that had some scripture to it.

Sardis. But names have a way of changin' out here, and this one changed to Ater, after a store owner by the name of Joe Ater, born in 1856, gone in 1928. Joe didn't just sell goods.

He ran the post office too, the only postmaster the community ever had, from 1899 all the way to 1907. One man, one store, one post office. That's a town right there.

Now, in those formative years, a Mr. Dooley and a fellow named Lemuel Murrell reportedly deeded land for a church, a school, and a cemetery. Three things a community needs if it means to last.

And this one meant to last. The cemetery itself reaches back further than most people expect. Two gravestones dated 1868 mark the resting places of two young women, Elvista and Leovisa Haley.

Eighteen sixty-eight. That's not history in a book. That's history in the ground.

Area settlers were already burying their people here before the ink dried on much of anything else in the region. And they kept on coming. Veterans of the War of 1812, the Civil War, World War I, World War II, and Korea all found their final rest in this quiet corner of Coryell County.

Think about that span of service laid into one small plot of land. An association still oversees the care of this site today, tending to a place that carries the heritage of the once-active community of Ater. The town may have gone quiet.

But the ground remembers.

What the marker says

Originally founded as Sardis, the town of Ater took its name from store owner Joe Ater (1856-1928), who also served as its only postmaster from 1899 to 1907. A Mr. Dooley and Lemuel Murrell reportedly deeded land for church, school and cemetery purposes during the community's formative years. The 1868 gravestones of two young women, Elvista and Leovisa Haley, attest to the early use of this cemetery by area settlers. Veterans laid to rest here served in the War of 1812, the Civil War, World War I, World War II and Korea. An association oversees the care of this site that records the heritage of the once-active community of Ater. Historic Texas Cemetery-2002.