Teel Cemetery

Duane's take

The way the marker tells it, here's what you need to know about Teel Cemetery. Richard Teel was born in Alabama in 1833, but East Texas is where his story took root. He came out here in the 1850s, and in 1858 he married Nancy A.

Hart. She had been born in 1842, and together they settled right here on this land, putting down the kind of roots that tend to outlast everything. For decades they built a life.

Then in 1893, their son D. J. died, and they buried him beside the family home. Right here.

Not in some distant churchyard, not in a town cemetery. Here, where the family lived and worked and knew every shadow the trees threw across the ground. Other burials followed.

Neighbors, friends, relatives. The land was quietly becoming something more than a homestead. And Richard Teel, who was not a man to leave important things informal, made it official in 1908.

He legally designated the site a cemetery. Named it, claimed it, set it apart. Nancy had passed in 1900, and Richard himself would follow in 1918.

Both of them are among the more than sixty graves that now rest here. Sixty souls, some with names in the family line, some simply neighbors who found their final place among the Teels. The cemetery sits inside the Big Thicket National Preserve now, which means the thicket that surrounded these early settlers has in a way come back to keep watch.

And that ground Richard Teel designated on paper in 1908 still stands as what the marker calls a tangible reminder of the area's early permanent settlers. He came from Alabama. He stayed.

And in the end, so did everything that mattered to him.

What the marker says

Alabama native Richard Teel (1833-1918) came to East Texas in the 1850s. He married Nancy A. Hart (1842-1900) in 1858 and they settled here. When the Teels' son, D. J., died in 1893, he was buried here beside the family home. In 1908, after other burials had taken place, Teel legally designated the site a cemetery. The more than sixty graves in the historic cemetery include those of Richard and Nancy Teel, as well as other relatives, friends, and neighbors. Now located in the Big Thicket National Preserve, the cemetery is a tangible reminder of the area's early permanent settlers.