The Community Church

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'm gonna let it do the talking. For fifty years, out in Winkler County, there were no church buildings to speak of. Just camp meetings under open sky, circuit riders coming through on horseback, singings and Sunday Schools held wherever settlers could gather, at ranches, at schoolhouses, anywhere four walls and some willing folks came together.

That was how people filled their religious needs for half a century, and it worked, the way things out here have a way of working when people don't have much choice but to make do. Then came 1928, and the Community Church was organized. Now, they needed a sanctuary.

What they got was the 1910 courthouse, bought for exactly one dollar. One dollar. You can't help but sit with that for a moment.

A whole courthouse, a building that had once held the business of law and order for this county, changed hands for a single bill. That became their first church. Time passed, and things changed out in Winkler County, the way they tend to when somebody drills a hole in the ground and oil comes up.

Generous ranchers, flush with what that discovery brought, put their resources toward something lasting. The first brick building ever erected in Kermit rose on the very site of that original one-dollar courthouse sanctuary. That's the present edifice, built by those ranchers and dedicated in 1938.

The first resident pastor was C. Y. Butler.

Fifty years of making do, a courthouse bought for a dollar, and then the first brick building in town. That congregation earned every one of those bricks.

What the marker says

50 years of camp meetings, circuit riders, singings and Sunday Schools at ranches or schoolhouses filled settlers' religious needs. In 1928, when this church was organized, its sanctuary was 1910 courthouse, bought for a dollar. Present edifice--first brick building in Kermit--is on site of that first church, and was built by generous ranchers after oil discovery. Dedicated 1938. First resident pastor was C. Y. Butler. (1966)