Turtle Creek School and Cemetery

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and here's how I'm gonna pass it along to you. Out in Kerr County, there's a little piece of ground that has been a lot of things to a lot of people, and it goes by the name Turtle Creek School and Cemetery. School, burial ground, polling place, community landmark.

Not bad for one quiet plot of Texas hill country. The schoolhouse and the nearby cemetery originally served the pioneer settlers of the Turtle Creek area. And when I say pioneer, I mean the kind of folks who were putting down roots in a place that didn't have much of anything yet.

The oldest marked grave in that cemetery belongs to Miles L. Denton, born in 1856, gone by 1875. That's a short chapter, and the marker lets it stand without any more explanation than that.

Also resting there is Susan Elizabeth Bird, born in 1866 and buried in 1887. She was the wife of J. Fisher Bird, the man who patented the survey on this land.

So the very ground the cemetery sits on, the Bird family had a hand in claiming it first. Now here's a detail that tends to catch people by surprise. Since 1885, this property has been used continuously as a voting place.

Continuously. Through drought and hard times and everything else the Hill Country could throw at a community, people kept showing up here to cast their votes. That's a long streak.

Then in 1892, the school trustees formalized their hold on the property through a land trade with a man named James Spicer. Classes went on being held in that schoolhouse for decades, all the way up until 1958. And when the schoolhouse finally went quiet, the story wasn't over.

In 1977, area residents bought the site back, for the benefit of the community. Not for profit, not for development. For the community.

Some places just refuse to stop mattering, and Turtle Creek is one of them.

What the marker says

This schoolhouse and nearby burial ground originally served the pioneer settlers of the Turtle Creek area. The oldest marked grave is that of Miles L. Denton (1856-75). Also buried in the cemetery is Susan Elizabeth Bird (1866-87), the wife of J. Fisher Bird who patented the survey. Continuously used as a voting place since 1885, this property was obtained by school trustees in 1892 through a land trade with James Spicer. Classes were held here until 1958. Area residents bought the site in 1977 for the benefit of the community. (1980)