Elizabeth Chapel Methodist Church

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and here's how I'm passing it on to you. Way out in Burleson County, before there were proper church buildings or much of anything else, a man named Isaac Addison opened his home. He was an early settler, and what he started in that home was a Sunday School.

Simple as that. Just folks gathering, learning, doing what they could with what they had. That right there was the seed of the first Methodist Church in the entire county.

Now the story doesn't stay in Isaac Addison's home for long. It moves, the way good things tend to do, down the road to the home of a woman named Mrs. Elizabeth Scott.

And then, around 1839, a man named Robert Alexander came through. The marker calls him a famous pioneer minister, and you get the feeling that title was earned the hard way, county by county, settlement by settlement. Alexander organized the congregation proper, gave it shape and purpose.

Before too long, a small, hand-hewn frame building went up. Every word of that description does some work. Hand-hewn.

Somebody swung an axe to make that church exist. And when they named it, they named it for Mrs. Elizabeth Scott, the woman who had taken them in.

Elizabeth Chapel. Now Mrs. Scott's son, Phillip, he honored his mother's connection to this place in a lasting way.

In 1878, he gave the land, the land containing both the church and the cemetery, to the Methodist Episcopal Church, South. A gift with weight to it. Then came the peak. 1885.

One hundred and sixty-five members. For a hand-hewn frame church that started as a Sunday School in somebody's living room, that is a number worth sitting with. But congregations have their seasons.

Around 1907, Elizabeth Chapel merged with the Cooks Point church. The first Methodist Church in Burleson County didn't vanish, exactly. It just joined something larger, carrying all those names, all those years, right along with it.

What the marker says

First Methodist Church in the county. Began as Sunday School in home of Isaac addison, early settler. Later moved to home of Mrs. Elizabeth Scott. Organized about 1839 by Robt. Alexander, famous pioneer minister. Soon a small, hand-hewn frame building was erected and named for Mrs. Scott. Land containing both the church and cemetery was given to Methodist Episcopal Church, South, by Mrs. Scott's son, Phillip, in 1878. Membership reached peak of 165 in 1885. Church merged with the Cooks Point church about 1907. (1970)