Bethel Baptist Church of Christ and Cemetery
Odem, San Patricio County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Organized on May 6, 1873, the Bethel Baptist Church of Christ was the first Baptist congregation in San Patricio County. The ten charter members represented the pioneer area communities of Sharpsburgh, Moore's Lake Settlement, and Meansville. Under the supervision of L.D. Young, a Baptist missionary, John Walker Baylor was selected as the first pastor. Alexander Moore served as the first deacon. Early worship services were held in Moore's Lake Settlement and in the Methodist Church sanctuary at Meansville. In 1877 trustees of the Bethel Baptist Church of Christ purchased land at this site from J.M. Garner for construction of a chapel and for the establishment of a burial ground. The cemetery was first used in 1877 for the burial of an unidentified Mexican girl. The earliest marked grave is that of E.A. Paschal (1857-1878). Also buried here are seven Confederate veterans of the Civil War and many pioneer settlers of the area. For a brief time during the late 1870s the church merged with the Nuecestown Baptist fellowship. Although the Bethel congregation never officially disbanded, services here ended in 1914 after members began attending the Baptist Church in Odem (2 miles north). (1981)
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Organized in 1873, Bethel Baptist Church of Christ was the first Baptist congregation in San Patricio County, its ten charter members drawn from the scattered pioneer settlements of Sharpsburgh, Moore's Lake, and Meansville. In 1877 the trustees bought this site for a chapel and burial ground, first used that year for an unidentified Mexican girl. Among those laid to rest here are seven Confederate veterans and many early settlers; services ended in 1914 as members moved to the church in nearby Odem.
Why it matters
Pioneer churches and their cemeteries chart the earliest gathering of a frontier county's people, preserving the names and faiths that knit isolated settlements into a community.
Own a business near here? Add it to the map.
Related people
- · John Walker Baylor
- · Alexander Moore
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
First United Methodist Church of Odem
Odem, TX
The first recorded church services in Odem were held in a private home in 1909, and by 1910–11 the Methodists had organized under visiting pastors and built a small frame church with just nine charter members. As the congregation and town grew together, a parsonage was added in 1922 and a new sanctuary rose in 1949 using lumber salvaged from the old building. Hurricanes battered the church repeatedly, but each time volunteers and insurance rebuilt it.
Odem First Baptist Church
Odem, TX
On April 28, 1912, the Baptists of Odem organized their own congregation with the help of a traveling missionary, meeting at first once a month in the Methodist church before land was donated for a frame sanctuary. Through donated labor, a Depression-era building, and a World War II that cost the church a member and made materials scarce, the congregation kept building—raising a brick sanctuary in 1951 and education wings in the decades after. Traditions like its harvest-day fundraiser have carried across a full century.
Meansville and Kaleta
Odem, TX
Col. William Marshall Means, a veteran of the 1836 Battle of San Jacinto, settled here in the 1850s and served as county sheriff, and a Methodist-built two-story hall became the heart of Meansville. The community's promise collapsed after 1876, when a shooting spree by the colonel's sons led to a deadly manhunt, the killing of Means and a sheriff, and finally a Texas Ranger order forcing the family out. Nearby Kaleta rose and faded in turn, its school and post office gone and the town wiped from the map by the great storm of 1919.
White Point/Rosita
Odem, TX
Long home to Native American peoples and later claimed by 18th-century Spanish explorers, this coastal area near Nueces Bay drew Anglo settlers in the 1830s and, in 1856, the White brothers, who founded a cattle ranch known as White Point. Confederate veteran Darius C. Rachal, hired to drive their herd from East Texas, stayed to build his own ranch and became the community's leading figure after the Whites died in a yellow fever epidemic. When the post office denied the name White Point, it opened in 1892 as Rosita, with Rachal as postmaster; the little community faded after his death in 1918.