Mount Zion Cemetery

Duane's take

Here's how the marker at Mount Zion Cemetery tells it, and I'll do my best to do it justice. Way out in San Jacinto County, there's a piece of ground that holds a whole community's memory, and it all starts with a land grant. John R.

Johnson received that grant in 1849, and it covered this very property. The following year, 1850, Johnson gave four and a quarter acres of it to Mount Zion Methodist Church. That was the seed of everything that followed.

Now, churchyard burials may have begun even before anyone thought to mark the graves with stone, but the oldest gravestone that survives bears the date 1870. So the earth here was receiving its neighbors quietly, patiently, long before the record catches up. The church itself stood through the years, then fell into ruin, and by 1928 the building was dismantled.

Gone. But the cemetery remained. It stayed right there, rooted, the one thing that wouldn't be carried off or knocked down.

Then came 1958, and something worth remarking on happened. Descendants of Harrells' settlement, of Mount Zion, and of Stephens Creek pioneers came together and began a yearly homecoming right here at the cemetery, the sole public landmark of their ancestors. Think about that word, sole.

One landmark. Everything else had faded, but the graves held the ground. By 1976, the count stood at about two hundred and fifty graves, most of them identified, and a number marked through the dedicated efforts of a special committee.

Two hundred and fifty souls, named and remembered, because people decided that was worth doing. That's the whole point of a homecoming, isn't it. Not to go back to a building.

To go back to the people.

What the marker says

John R. Johnson, whose 1849 land grant included this property, gave 4.25 acres in 1850 to Mount Zion Methodist Church. Churchyard burials may have begun earlier, but oldest gravestone is dated 1870. The church building was dismantled in 1928 after it fell into ruin. In 1958, descendants of Harrells' settlement, Mount Zion, and Stephens Creek pioneers began a yearly homecoming here at the sole public landmark of their ancestors, the cemetery. As of 1976, there are about 250 graves-- most of them identified and a number marked through efforts of a special committee.