First Presbyterian Church of Sulphur Springs

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'm passing it right along to you. You know, some churches just show up in a town, get themselves a building, and coast along. This one earned its place the hard way.

The First Presbyterian Church of Sulphur Springs was organized in 1852, and when it started out, it wasn't much more than eight people and a ruling elder named Samuel Davidson. Eight members. You could fit the whole congregation in a decent-sized kitchen.

But they had a church to build, so they did what Texans do when resources are thin and the work is big. They found a partner. The congregation joined up with the Cumberland Presbyterians and the two groups erected a sanctuary together on Connally Street.

Shared labor, shared pews, shared purpose. That building stood until 1873, when it burned. Just like that, gone.

A jointly built sanctuary, and fire took it. Now, that's the kind of thing that ends some congregations. Not this one.

The membership constructed a frame building at this very site in July of 1882. They put it up, and they kept going. Then in 1886, the Reverend J.

C. Crow became the first resident pastor. Before him, whoever was tending to the flock wasn't living among them.

Crow changed that. And the year after, 1887, a man named W. P.

McDonald, clerk of the session, sat down and kept the first records. First. As in, before McDonald, there was no written record of the session's business.

He started the paper trail. Then in 1890, Mrs. Lena Johnson founded the Ladies Missionary Society, adding yet another thread to what this little eight-member church from 1852 had grown into.

And in 1920, they built the present sanctuary. The one standing there right now. Nearly seventy years after eight people and Samuel Davidson decided they had a church on their hands.

An educational facility was added in 1981, just the year before this marker was set down. Eight members in 1852, a burned sanctuary, a frame building hammered up in July, a first pastor, first records, a missionary society, and a sanctuary that's still standing. That's not coasting.

That's a congregation that kept showing up.

What the marker says

Organized in 1852, this church had eight members with Samuel Davidson as the ruling elder. A sanctuary erected jointly by this congregation and the Cumberland Presbyterians on Connally Street burned in 1873. The membership constructed a frame building at this site in July 1882. The Rev. J. C. Crow became the first resident pastor in 1886, and W. P. McDonald, clerk of the session, kept the first records in 1887. In 1890 Mrs. Lena Johnson began the Ladies Missionary Society. The present sanctuary was built in 1920, and an educational facility was added in 1981.