Bryan City Cemetery

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'll do my best to do it justice. Now, every good Texas town eventually has to reckon with the same hard fact: the living need a place to stay, and so do the departed. Bryan, Texas was no different.

The townsite had been dedicated, and three years on, the city turned its attention to a piece of ground on the northern edge of town. On June 13, 1868, the Bryan City Cemetery was established. Twenty acres of land, sold to the city for a hundred dollars by a landowner named J.C.

Hubert. A hundred dollars. For twenty acres.

For eternity. You think about that a moment. The city got itself a graveyard, and many of the most prominent early citizens of Bryan eventually found their final rest right there on that northern edge of town.

Now, land has a way of filling up, and time has a way of marching on. The first addition was made on June 15, 1915, and by the time you add it all together, that original twenty acres had grown to forty-eight. The cemetery didn't just grow in size, it grew in purpose and in care.

The Bryan Cemetery Association was organized on November 30, 1920, and alongside the City Cemetery Advisory Board, they have served in an advisory capacity in the operation of the cemetery ever since. What started as a hundred-dollar transaction and twenty acres on the edge of a young town became something far larger, and far more enduring, than anyone likely put into words on that June day in 1868.

What the marker says

Established on June 13, 1868, three years after the townsite of Bryan was dedicated. Land for the graveyard--20 acres then on the northern edge of Bryan--was sold to the city for $100 by landowner J.C. Hubert. The first addition of land was made June 15, 1915; the area is now 48 acres. Many prominent early citizens are buried here. The City Cemetery Advisory Board and the Bryan Cemetery Association (organized November 30, 1920) serve in an advisory capacity in the operation of the cemetery.