DUANE
Duane's take
Here's my telling of what the official marker has to say about Johnsville Cemetery, out in Erath County. Now, before a community can have a cemetery, it has to have a community. And Johnsville had one — a real one.
Settled before 1860, it grew into what you'd call a thriving village on the main road between Stephenville and Glen Rose. Think about what that means for a minute. The main road.
The kind of place where travelers stopped, where commerce hummed, where life stacked up on itself. General stores. A cotton gin.
A blacksmith shop. Fraternal lodges. A school.
A church. Homes. The whole human arrangement.
The name Johnsville itself came along in 1901, when a man named John Z. Martin was appointed first postmaster. The community had been there for decades before the name caught up to it.
Now, the cemetery. The land — one and a half acres, to be precise — was sold in 1910 by Edward and Martha Cox, Martha being born a Shaw, to sit right there adjoining the Christian church. And the marker tells us something worth holding onto: that church was already almost fifteen years old at the time of that sale.
It wasn't new. Johnsville wasn't new. These were people with roots.
But the oldest graves in Johnsville Cemetery are not those of founders or merchants or men of standing. They belong to two infant children. The infant children of Curtis and Annie Burks — Annie born a Cox — and of W.
B. and Mary Cox, Mary born a Smith. Two families. Four parents.
Two little ones believed to have died in 1907 and 1910. There is no tall tale in that. Just the quiet weight of it.
And the people who came after them in that ground — teachers, Masons, blacksmiths, merchants, soldiers, preachers, farmers, mothers, fathers, children — the marker lists them not as categories but as a congregation. Pioneers from all walks of life, it says. And many of them and their descendants were interred right there in Johnsville Cemetery.
Time, though, has a way of consolidating things. In 1948, the Johnsville School was folded together with schools from Pony Creek and Chalk Mountain to form the Three Way School District. The stores closed.
The gin went quiet. By 1997, only two things remained to mark what Johnsville had been: the Church of Christ — the old Christian Church under a new name — and the cemetery. The road from Stephenville to Glen Rose still runs through that country.
The village that once sat along it is mostly memory now. But the Johnsville Cemetery, the marker tells us, continues to serve the area. That's not a small thing.
That's a community keeping faith with itself, all the way to the end.
What the marker says
The community of Johnsville, settled before 1860, was named for John Z. Martin when he was appointed first postmaster in 1901. Once a thriving village on the main road from Stephenville to Glen Rose, Johnsville consisted of general stores, a cotton gin, blacksmith shop, fraternal lodges, a school, a church, and numerous homes. The oldest graves in Johnsville Cemetery are those of the two infant children of Curtis and Annie (Cox) Burks and of W. B. and Mary (Smith) Cox. The children are believed to have died in 1907 and 1910. In 1910 Edward and Martha (Shaw) Cox sold 1.5 acres of land adjoining the Christian church for use as a cemetery. The church was then almost fifteen years old. Pioneers from all walks of life settled in the area; teachers, Masons, blacksmiths, merchants, soldiers, preachers, farmers, mothers, fathers, children, and many others created the community known as Johnsville. Many of them and their descendants were interred here in the Johnsville Cemetery. In 1948 the Johnsville School was consolidated with schools in Pony Creek and Chalk Mountain to form the Three Way School District. By 1997, only the Church of Christ (formerly called the Christian Church) and the cemetery remained as a record of the area's pioneer settlement. The Johnsville Cemetery continues to serve the area. (1998)