First Baptist Church of Mixon

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'll do my best to do it justice. Way out in Cherokee County, there's a little place called Mixon, and if you blink, you might miss it. But that would be a shame, because what's still standin there has been holdin this corner of Texas together since before the Civil War.

The marker calls it the First Baptist Church of Mixon, but that name took a good long while to stick. This place went through more names than a wanted man on the run. It starts back in 1853, when the area was known as Pine Springs.

That year, somebody decided this patch of East Texas needed a church, and they built one, an ecumenical church, open to all comers. That was the first church in this area. Then came 1866.

The war was over, the world had shifted, and the Rev. E. M.

Carter and a deacon named Elias Stephens stepped up to do something deliberate. They established the Union Baptist Church, with fifteen members, every single one of them formerly of that earlier congregation. Same people, new covenant.

In 1881, the church got a new name: Pine Springs Baptist Church. And then in 1887, the members did something you could point to, something you could see from the road. They erected a white frame building right here on this site.

Now, communities have a way of reinventing themselves too. In 1889, when a post office was established, the settlement took the name Mixon, and that one finally held. A few years into the new century, a preacher came through who was going places.

The Rev. W. R.

White served this church from 1911 to 1913. He would later become president of Baylor University. He passed through Mixon on his way to bigger stages, and Mixon was part of what shaped him.

The settlement kept growin over the next several years. Then 1946 brought one final renaming. The congregation voted, the name changed, and First Baptist Church of Mixon is what it's been ever since.

A new building went up in 1952. Today, the marker calls this church among the last vestiges of Mixon. The post office is gone.

The community faded. But the church is still there, still in the traditions of its founders, standin on the same site where that white frame building rose in 1887. Some things, it turns out, outlast everything else.

What the marker says

The first church in this area, then known as Pine Springs, was established as an ecumenical church in 1853. The Rev. E. M. Carter and Elias Stephens, a deacon, established the Union Baptist Church in 1866 with 15 members, all formerly of the earlier congregation. The church was renamed Pine Springs Baptist Church in 1881. Members erected a white frame building on this site in 1887. The community was renamed Mixon when a post office was established in 1889. The Rev. W. R. White, later president of Baylor University, served the church from 1911 to 1913. The settlement grew over the next several years. In 1946 the church was renamed First Baptist Church of Mixon. A new building was erected in 1952. Among the last vestiges of Mixon, the church continues in the traditions of its founders. (2000)