First Methodist Church of Allen
Allen, Collin County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Methodists were among the earliest settlers in Collin County. A group of thirteen pioneers met at Joseph Russell’s log cabin close to present-day Allen on November 15, 1847 and organized a church. Russell’s home was located south of Rowlett Creek near present-day Jupiter Road. The church services became part of the far-reaching Dallas circuit and were presided over by multiple traveling ministers. The growing congregation moved three miles to the west and conducted meetings at the Spring Creek School when it was built in 1857. However, when the railroad came through in 1876, the church was moved several miles away to Plano. The community, which the church had served, was organized as Allen in 1876. Area Methodists were eager to establish a church closer to their community. Early meetings were most likely held in the Allen Schoolhouse, but soon after, the Baptists opened their church doors to let the Methodists worship independently. The first known Allen pastor was Methodist camp preacher and revivalist Rev. George S. Gatewood, who held camp meetings under a brush arbor at Pegues Springs, southeast of town. The Methodist Church purchased a parcel of land in 1884, but it is unclear if a church was built on this site. A second plot they bought was on the corner of S. Allen Dr. And McDermott Rd., and a one-room church house was built there in 1902. Damaged in the 1910s, a new building was constructed between 1917-19, and was razed in 1965. The current building on S. Greenville Ave. was built in 1966. The first parsonage, which is still standing, was built on Butler Street and used until 1960. A notable member of the congregation was Dr. Malcom O. Perry II, one of the surgeons who attended President John F. Kennedy at Parkland Hospital in Dallas on November 22, 1963.
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
On November 15, 1847, thirteen pioneers gathered in Joseph Russell's log cabin near present-day Allen to organize one of Collin County's earliest Methodist congregations, served at first by circuit-riding preachers on the far-flung Dallas circuit. As the railroad reshaped the area in the 1870s, the church followed its people, worshiping in schoolhouses and, thanks to neighborly Baptists, in borrowed pews before building its own house in 1902. Through fires, rebuildings, and a final 1966 sanctuary, the congregation endured—counting among its members Dr. Malcolm O. Perry, a surgeon who treated President Kennedy in 1963.
Why it matters
From frontier brush-arbor camp meetings to the modern era, the church shows how itinerant Methodist circuit riders helped plant permanent communities across settling Texas.
The story behind this marker
AI contextThe era
When thirteen settlers crowded into a log cabin near Rowlett Creek in November 1847, the ink was barely dry on Texas statehood. Texas had joined the Union less than two years earlier, and the United States was in the middle of its war with Mexico. Collin County itself was brand new, freshly carved out of the blackland prairie that drew farming families north from the older settlements around Dallas.
This was raw frontier. There were no towns to speak of, no railroads, and few roads worth the name — just scattered homesteads, creek crossings, and the long distances that separated one family from the next. A settler who wanted to worship, or to marry, or to bury a loved one with a few words spoken over the grave, often had to wait for a preacher to ride through.
Into that gap rode the Methodist circuit. Rather than wait for a church to be built, the Methodist system sent ministers on horseback along vast "circuits" that could take weeks to complete, holding services in cabins, under trees, and at brush arbors. The little gathering at Joseph Russell's home became one stop on the far-flung Dallas circuit — a single thread in a network that stitched isolated families into congregations across the settling West.
People & events
It began at Joseph Russell's log cabin, south of Rowlett Creek near what is now Jupiter Road, where a handful of Methodist pioneers organized themselves into a church in the autumn of 1847. For years they had no building of their own; traveling ministers came and went, and the congregation followed its people rather than a fixed address.
The railroad rewrote the map. When the tracks came through in 1876, the church was picked up and moved several miles to Plano, and that same year the community left behind was organized as the town of Allen. The Methodists of Allen wanted a church closer to home, and their neighbors made it possible — after early meetings likely held in the Allen schoolhouse, it was the town's Baptists who opened their own doors so the Methodists could worship on their own.
The congregation's own home came slowly. A camp preacher and revivalist, the Reverend George S. Gatewood, held meetings under a brush arbor at Pegues Springs southeast of town. Land was purchased in 1884, and a one-room church house finally rose at another site in 1902. It was damaged in the 1910s, rebuilt at the end of that decade, and eventually gave way to the sanctuary the congregation raised in 1966. Among the members across those years was Dr. Malcolm O. Perry II — one of the surgeons who attended President John F. Kennedy at Parkland Hospital in Dallas in November 1963.
Its place in the American story
The story of this one congregation is, in miniature, the story of how much of America was settled. Ahead of courthouses and railroads and paved streets came the circuit rider — a Methodist innovation that carried organized religion into places too small and too new to support a resident minister. The system was built for exactly the frontier it met here: mobile, tireless, and content to preach in a borrowed cabin.
That mobility is the point. This church existed as a community of people long before it existed as a building, and when the railroad moved the people, the church moved too. Across the settling states, congregations like this one were often the first permanent institutions to take root — the thing that turned a scattering of homesteads into a town with a name.
And because a small-town congregation is a cross-section of American life, its membership rolls can brush against the largest national events. The presence here of a physician who stood at President Kennedy's side on one of the nation's darkest days is a reminder that the history recorded on a modest church marker is never fully separate from the history in the headlines.
If you visit
Come to this spot expecting a story rather than a monument. The congregation has occupied several sites over its long life, and the marker's real subject is the journey itself — from a log cabin on the creek, to a schoolhouse, to borrowed Baptist pews, to a one-room church, to the building the congregation raised in the mid-1960s.
Stand for a moment with the distances in mind. The brush arbor at Pegues Springs, the crossing at Rowlett Creek, the vanished settlement that became Allen when the tracks arrived — these were all a day's slow travel apart in a landscape without highways. Picturing a minister covering that ground on horseback is the best way to feel what "frontier church" actually meant.
It makes a natural stop on a drive through Collin County's older towns, where the arrival of the railroad in the 1870s is written all over the map. Read the marker, then look around at how much has grown up since — and remember that it started with thirteen people who decided a cabin was enough to begin.
Written by AI to add context, grounded in the marker’s inscription and the historical record. The inscription above is the original, unaltered text.
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Related people
- · Joseph Russell
- · Rev. George S. Gatewood
- · Dr. Malcolm O. Perry II
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
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