First United Methodist Church of Wichita Falls

Duane's take

Here's my telling of what the official marker has to say about this place. Now, every town worth its dust has a story that starts somewhere humble, and Wichita Falls is no different. This one begins in March of 1881, not in some grand sanctuary with stained glass and stone columns, but in somebody's living room.

Alfred H. Harris opened his home, and that was enough. F.

O. Miller was the pastor, and six charter members gathered together, and right there, the first congregation ever organized in Wichita Falls drew its first breath. Six people.

One pastor. One home. That's your foundation.

From there, they moved to a log schoolhouse, and when that wasn't enough, they held services in the courthouse. They were a congregation in motion, growing, searching, building toward something they could feel but hadn't yet built. Two sanctuaries came and went, each one serving a membership that kept on swelling.

Then came the building they'd been working toward all along. Completed in 1928, designed by a Houston architect named William Ward Watkin, it rose in the Gothic revival style, the kind of architecture that says, we are not going anywhere. Those soaring lines, those echoes of something ancient, right there in Wichita Falls, Texas.

From a living room in 1881 to a Gothic revival landmark in 1928, that congregation just kept on building. Some things, it turns out, are worth the wait.

What the marker says

This congregation, the first to be organized in Wichita Falls, began in March 1881 at the home of Alfred H. Harris, with F. O. Miller as pastor, six charter members held services in a log schoolhouse and later in the courthouse. Two sanctuaries were erected to serve the growing membership before this building was completed in 1928. Designed by Houston architect William Ward Watkin, the building features Gothic revival styling. (Recorded Texas Historic Landmark - 1983.)