St. James Church

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and here's how I'm going to tell it to you. Way out in Dallam County, there's a little Episcopal church with a story that starts before it even had walls. St.

James Church was organized by 1902, but the congregation wasn't going to let a little thing like not having a building stop them. They worshipped wherever they could find a door that would open. Other churches took them in.

A bank, if you can picture that, pews between the tellers and the loan desk. And then there was the Felton Opera House, which, honestly, might be the most dramatic venue any congregation ever called home on a Sunday morning. You want to talk about high ceilings and good acoustics, well.

Finally, in 1910, they built their own church. A place to call their own after all those years of borrowed roofs. And then came January 8, 1911.

Consecration day. Now here's the detail that stops you cold. The man who performed that consecration, the Rt.

Rev. E. A.

Temple, Bishop of the North Texas Missionary District, was carrying out his very first episcopal act. Not just another Sunday on his calendar. His first.

So when he walked through those doors and consecrated St. James Church, that congregation out on the High Plains became part of something he would carry with him for the rest of his career. A bank, an opera house, a borrowed pew or two, and then one January morning, a church all their own, and a bishop's very first blessing.

That's St. James.

What the marker says

Organized by 1902. Church built in 1910. Previously, congregation had worshipped in other churches, a bank, and Felton Opera House. Consecrated on January 8, 1911, in first episcopal act of the Rt. Rev. E. A. Temple, Bishop of the North Texas Missionary District. Recorded Texas Historic Landmark, 1966