DUANE
Duane's take
Here's how the official marker tells it, and here's how I'm gonna tell it to you. Thurber, Texas — now there's a town that had quite a life and quite an ending, but before we get to the ending, let's talk about the church that somehow outlasted almost everything else. Most of Thurber's immigrant population represented eighteen nationalities, and a good many of those folks were Catholic.
For years, missionary priests came through to minister to the town — no permanent home, just men on the move, tending to a congregation that had roots in nearly every corner of the Old World. That went on until 1892, when the coal company stepped in and erected a Catholic church right there at the bottom of graveyard hill. Now if that location doesn't set a mood, I don't know what does.
The church was originally named St. Thuribus. But it didn't keep that name long.
It was renamed St. Barbara's — to honor the patroness saint of miners. Fitting, when you think about the kind of work those eighteen nationalities were doing in the ground beneath their feet.
A church school called Hunter Academy operated alongside the congregation from 1894 to 1923, giving the community's children a place to learn in a town built around hard, dangerous labor. Then came the 1930s, and Thurber was dismantled. The town that had held all those nationalities together just... came apart.
But St. Barbara's — they moved it. Two miles north to Mingus, where it stood and waited.
And here's the part of the story that earns its ending: in 1993, Thurber preservationists brought that church building back. Back to the bottom of graveyard hill, where it belongs. Some things, it turns out, are worth carrying home.
What the marker says
Most of Thurber's immigrant population, representing eighteen nationalities, were Catholic. Missionary priests ministered to the town until 1892, when the coal company erected a Catholic church at the bottom of graveyard hill. Originally named St. Thuribus, it was renamed St. Barbara's to honor the patroness saint of miners. A church school, Hunter Academy, operated from 1894 to 1923. The church building was moved two miles north to Mingus when Thurber was dismantled in the 1930s, and was returned to Thurber in 1993 by Thurber preservationists. (1995)