Mingus Baptist Church

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and here's how I tell it back to you. Way out in Palo Pinto County, in the little town of Mingus, there's a Baptist congregation with roots that go deep, deep into the Texas soil. And I mean that literally, because this story starts not in a proper church building, but in a schoolhouse.

A rural schoolhouse, the kind that doubled as the center of everything that mattered in a small community. Back in 1891, a group of area Baptists gathered together, and the Pleasant Hill Missionary Baptist Church was organized. Fourteen charter members.

Fourteen people who decided that was enough to make something real and lasting. Now, that name, Pleasant Hill, came straight from the schoolhouse where they held those early worship services. Not a grand cathedral, not a stately sanctuary.

A schoolhouse. And for years, that's where they met. Then came 1900, and the congregation took on a new name.

Mingus Baptist Church. The Pleasant Hill days weren't forgotten, just turned into a chapter. The next chapter had a different title.

A few years later, in 1905, two people, Guy B. and Lucile Wilson, made a decision that would anchor everything that followed. They deeded this very property to the congregation, for religious purposes. That's the kind of gift that doesn't just give once.

It keeps giving. Because starting in 1906, services have been held at that site. Continually.

Not occasionally. Not on and off. Continually, right on through to today.

Active in missionary programs, the congregation never stopped playing an important role in the religious life of Mingus. Fourteen charter members in a schoolhouse in 1891. That's where it started.

And it never stopped.

What the marker says

Area Baptists trace their history to 1891, when the Pleasant Hill Missionary Baptist Church congregation was organized with 14 charter members. Originally named for the rural schoolhouse where early worship services were held, the congregation was renamed Mingus Baptist Church in 1900. In 1905, Guy B. and Lucile Wilson deeded this property to the congregation for religious purposes, and services have been held at this site continually since 1906. Active in missionary programs, the congregation continues to play an important role in the religious life of Mingus. (1992)