HistoricSiteMarkers
Reconstruction & Gilded Age

Cooks Point United Methodist Church

Cooks Point, Burleson County, Texas

Marker Inscription

This congregation began in 1881 to serve the German speaking population in the area. Organized largely through the efforts of Anna Duewall, who had come to Burleson County with her family in 1880, the fellowship originally was known as the German Methodist Church, Caldwell. The Rev. Jacob Ott served as first pastor. Worship services were held in the members' homes until a sanctuary was built in 1883. The congregation adopted the name Cooks Point in the 1940s and continues to play an important role in the surrounding rural area. (1984)

Erected by Texas Historical Commission

The Story

This congregation formed in 1881 to serve the German-speaking families settling Burleson County, organized largely through the efforts of Anna Duewall, who had arrived with her family only a year before. Known first as the German Methodist Church and led by the Rev. Jacob Ott, the fellowship met in members' homes until it built a sanctuary in 1883 and later took the name Cooks Point.

Why it matters

It shows how immigrant communities planted enduring rural churches — often through the initiative of a determined founder — to anchor life in the Texas countryside.

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Related people

  • · Anna Duewall
  • · Jacob Ott

Themes & tags

Nearby & related markers

New Tabor Brethren Church

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Around 1870, Czech-Moravian immigrants seeking fertile land and the religious freedom denied them in Europe settled this part of Burleson County. Services first met in a family home until a pastor answered the call in 1877, and the congregation built its first sanctuary in 1893, taking the name New Tabor. Rebuilt after a 1915 tornado and again in 1953, the church hosted the state convention of Czech-Moravian churches and nurtured a web of societies for men, women, and youth.

Josef Masik

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Josef Masik, born in Moravia in 1810, was certified to teach at just sixteen before emigrating to Texas in 1855 in search of freedom from oppression. After great hardship he resumed his profession in 1859, teaching as many as fifty pupils a year until his retirement in 1872. He is remembered as the first Czech teacher in Texas.

New Tabor Cemetery

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New Tabor was settled by Czech and German immigrants in the 1870s and 1880s and named for the town of Tabor in their Bohemian homeland. In 1888 Henry Ginzel sold land to community trustees for a cemetery, whose first burials that year included an infant and a settler named Martin Fojt. The many infant and child graves speak to the hardships of pioneer life, while a cluster of 1919 deaths likely marks the influenza pandemic; more than 35 military veterans rest here among over 800 graves.

St. Mary's Our Lady of Lourdes Catholic Church

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