DUANE
Duane's take
Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'll do my best to do it justice. Now, some men live a life that reads like a trail map — one stop leading to the next, each one farther from where they started and closer to something bigger. John C.
Woolam was that kind of man. He came into this world on January 15, 1813, in South Carolina. But South Carolina was just the beginning.
He'd make his way through Tennessee, then down into Florida, where he served in the Indian Wars. A man who'd already seen war and wandering before Texas ever crossed his mind. But Texas crossed his mind in 1838, and when it did, he came.
And two years after arriving, in 1840, the Methodist Church licensed him to preach. That's where the real journey started. Fifty years.
Thirty-four churches. East Texas, Southeast Texas — the piney woods, the river bottoms, the little towns that needed a voice and a presence. Fifty years of circuit riding and sermons and community, one congregation at a time.
You stop and let that sink in a moment. Then came the Civil War, and John C. Woolam served as a Confederate chaplain.
Not with a rifle — with a ministry, in the middle of all that suffering. And when the war was long over and Texas was rebuilding itself, Woolam was still there. As chaplain of the Texas Veterans Association, he stood before the assembled crowd in 1888 at the opening of the State Capitol building and delivered the dedicatory prayer.
He died on January 18, 1894. But before he went, he had prayed over a Capitol, tended thirty-four churches, and crossed half a continent in service. Not a bad trail map for one life.
What the marker says
(January 15, 1813 -- January 18, 1894) South Carolina native John C. Woolam lived in Tennessee and served in the Florida Indian Wars before coming to Texas in 1838. After being licensed to preach by the Methodist Church in 1840, he served 34 churches in East and Southeast Texas during the next 50 years. He was a Confederate chaplain during the Civil War, and as chaplain of the Texas Veterans Association he delivered the dedicatory prayer at the opening of the State Capitol building in 1888. Recorded - 1994