DUANE
Duane's take
The official marker in Brown County tells this one, and I'm just the voice carryin' it forward. Now, some men leave a mark on one chapter of Texas history. Noah T.
Byars managed to leave his fingerprints on just about the whole book. He was born in Spartanburg, South Carolina, in 1808, and by the early 1830s he'd made his way to Texas and set up a blacksmith and gunsmith shop at Washington-on-the-Brazos. That's not a bad address to have.
Because it was right there — in that very place — that delegates gathered and adopted the Declaration of Independence from Mexico on March 2, 1836. The man was already there, hammer in hand, when Texas announced itself to the world. And the newly declared Republic didn't let him sit idle.
Immediately following that declaration, Byars was appointed armorer of the Texas army. After victory at San Jacinto, he served as sergeant-at-arms of the Texas Senate, and then as justice of the peace in Travis County. For a man who'd come to Texas to run a shop, he'd found himself woven deep into the fabric of the young republic.
But something else was stirring in Noah Byars. He'd been a charter member of the Baptist church established at Washington-on-the-Brazos in 1838, and on October 16, 1841, he was ordained to preach. That was the pivot point.
From then on, the frontier was his congregation. In 1848, the Baptist State Convention appointed Byars as its very first missionary. First.
And he took that assignment seriously — more than seriously. He is credited with founding more than sixty churches and four Baptist associations, devoting the last forty years of his life to establishing congregations out on the Texas frontier. Sixty churches.
You want to talk about a man who showed up for work. In 1876, he helped organize the First Baptist Church of Brownwood. And in 1882, he moved to Brownwood permanently.
Now, you might think a man of his years would slow down. You would be wrong. From Brownwood, Noah Byars began writing letters — letter after letter — to Baptist ministers across the region, urging them to create a Baptist college in central Texas.
He didn't live to see it happen. Noah T. Byars died in 1888, and he is buried in Brownwood's Greenleaf Cemetery.
But that idea he'd been pushing? It came to fulfillment under the leadership of Dr. John D.
Robnett, pastor of Brownwood's First Baptist Church — and Howard Payne College opened in 1889, one year after Byars was gone. He planted the seed, and then he trusted Texas to tend it. Turns out, it did.
What the marker says
Noah T. Byars (1808-1888) played an integral role in the establishment of the Baptist denomination in Texas. Born in Spartanburg, South Carolina, he arrived in Texas in the early 1830s and set up a blacksmith/gunsmith shop at Washington-on-the-Brazos, where delegates met and adopted the Declaration of Independence from Mexico on March 2, 1836. Immediately following the declaration, Byars was appointed armorer of the Texas army. Following victory at San Jacinto, he served as sergeant-at-arms of the Texas Senate and justice of the peace in Travis County. A charter member of the Baptist church established at Washington-on-the-Brazos in 1838, Byars was ordained to preach on October 16, 1841. The Baptist State Convention appointed Byars as its first missionary in 1848. Credited with founding more than 60 churches and four Baptist associations, Byars devoted the last 40 years of his life to establishing congregations on the Texas frontier. He helped organize the First Baptist Church of Brownwood in 1876. After moving permanently to Brownwood in 1882, Noah Byars began writing letters to other Baptist ministers urging the creation of a Baptist college in central Texas. That idea was brought to fulfillment under the leadership of Dr. John D. Robnett, pastor of Brownwood's First Baptist Church, with the opening of Howard Payne College in 1889, one year after Byars' death. He is buried in Brownwood's Greenleaf Cemetery. (2001)