Cumberland Presbyterian Church (Fort Street Presbyterian Church)
San Marcos, Hays County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Cumberland Presbyterian Church (Fort Street Presbyterian Church) An architectural landmark in San Marcos, this church building exhibits Classic elements of the Gothic Revival style in its pointed arch Gothic windows, with Queen Anne influences in the fish scale shingling and octagonal towers. Dating to at least 1901, it originally served the Cumberland Presbyterian Church, known as the Fort Street Presbyterian Church after 1910. In the mid-20th century, the building was home to the First American Lutheran Church and then to the Pentecostal Holiness Church before its rehabilitation for office and residential space in the 1990s. Recorded Texas Historic Landmark - 2001
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Built by at least 1901, this San Marcos church blends the pointed Gothic Revival arches of a house of worship with the fish-scale shingling and octagonal towers of the Queen Anne style. Raised by the Cumberland Presbyterians and later renamed Fort Street Presbyterian, it passed through Lutheran and Pentecostal congregations before being rehabilitated for office and residential use in the 1990s.
Why it matters
Its layered life as multiple churches and then offices shows how a single well-built landmark can serve a changing community across more than a century.
Own a business near here? Add it to the map.
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
First Presbyterian Church
San Marcos, TX
Presbyterian settlers in San Marcos first gathered in the log courthouse in 1848 to hear sermons from Nathaniel P. Charlot, and the church was formally organized in 1853 by circuit-riding ministers. From its first building in 1872, the congregation grew through the 19th and 20th centuries, dedicating its present sanctuary in 1953 on the church's 100th anniversary.
Caldwell-Kone-Hyatt House
San Marcos, TX
Robert M. Caldwell, son of pioneer Texas colonists, built this San Marcos house in 1869. His wife was a sister of Edward M. House, the shadowy "Colonel House" who became President Woodrow Wilson's closest confidential adviser. The Kone family owned it from 1874, among them Edward Rives Kone, a long-serving county judge who won election as state agriculture commissioner in 1908.
Heard-Baker House
San Marcos, TX
Built around 1889, this Queen Anne home near San Marcos was bought by rancher Samuel McGehee Heard, whose surrounding land was ample enough to graze livestock. His family lived here until 1944, when Robert Lee Baker purchased the house. Its octagonal corner tower and Eastlake porch millwork mark it as a showpiece of late-nineteenth-century Texas taste.
Ragsdale-Jackman-Yarbrough House
San Marcos, TX
Built in 1868 by Peter C. Ragsdale, a veteran of the Republic of Texas army, this San Marcos house later sheltered a girls' school run by his widow Elmira before passing in 1891 to "Uncle Billy" Jackman. Jackman lived a quintessential Texas life — a trail driver to Kansas in the 1870s and '80s, later Hays County sheriff, town postmaster, and president of the Trail Drivers Association. Restored by educators in 1947, the home links the frontier, cattle-drive, and civic eras of Central Texas.