Original Site, Burkeville Methodist Church

Duane's take

The way the marker tells it, here's the story of this ground in Newton County. Back in 1850, John R. and Mary W. Burke sold a tract of land at this very site to the local Methodist Episcopal Church, South.

The price? One dollar. One single dollar for the land that would hold a church building and a cemetery both.

Now you might expect a Methodist church to sit on ground with Methodist roots running straight down to bedrock, but here's the thing that gives this story its particular flavor. The oldest known grave in that cemetery belongs to Burke himself, who died in 1855. The founder of Burkeville.

And he was Roman Catholic. The man sold the Methodists their land, and they buried him in the yard. There's something right and generous about that, and you'd do well to sit with it a moment.

In that era, the congregation was served by circuit riders, those traveling preachers who covered enormous stretches of Texas on horseback, bringing the church to people who couldn't always come to it. And the congregation they served included both black and white worshipers together. By the 1870s, a simple frame church had gone up on this site, with a bell tower and a steeple, and that building was pulling double duty.

It served as a schoolhouse, it served all faiths as a funeral chapel, and it answered the call every time the bell rang. One modest frame structure carrying the weight of a whole community's learning and grief and faith. It stood here doing all of that for generations.

Then, in 1948, the structure was removed from this site. The land stayed. The cemetery stayed.

The dollar-deed story stayed. Some things outlast the building.

What the marker says

In 1850 John R. and Mary W. Burke sold for one dollar to the local Methodist Episcopal Church, South, a tract of land at this site for a church building and cemetery. The oldest known grave here is that of Burke (d.1855), a Roman Catholic who founded Burkeville. In that era, circuit riders served the congregation, which included both black and white worshipers. A simple frame church with bell tower and steeple erected here doubled as a schoolhouse in the 1870s and served all faiths as a funeral chapel. The structure was removed from this site in 1948.