First Presbyterian Church of Rusk
Rusk, Cherokee County, Texas
Marker Inscription
The Cumberland Presbyterian Church of Rusk was organized on May 2, 1847 by the Rev. J. B. Harris, with a charter membership of four. A Sunday School was begun in 1850, and existed as a Union school until the 1880s. Ecumenical relationships were strong with other churches in town, and the Presbyterian church building was used by various denominations. The "Old School" congregation of the Presbyterian Church in the U.S. was organized in March 1831 by the Rev. J. M. Becton and the Rev. J. C. Sharp, with eight charter members. A sanctuary was built on Henderson Street in 1854, and a parsonage was added in 1888-1889, largely through the efforts of the Ladies' Aid Society. The two congregations united to form the First Presbyterian Church on April 6, 1906. This property was acquired, and both church buildings were moved to the new site. The "Old School" church was converted to a parsonage. The present sanctuary was built in 1913-14, and was the first brick church in Rusk. A new parsonage was added in 1925. Throughout its history, which began one year after the city's founding, the Presbyterian church has sought to serve its community with outreach programs.
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Presbyterian worship in Rusk began in 1847, just a year after the town's founding, when the Cumberland Presbyterian Church was organized with only four members. A separate 'Old School' congregation dated to 1831 and built its own sanctuary in 1854. The two united in 1906 as the First Presbyterian Church, and in 1913-14 raised the town's first brick church, sustained across the decades by the labors of its Ladies' Aid Society.
Why it matters
The joining of two rival Presbyterian branches into one congregation mirrors the broader reunion of a denomination once split, while the church's founding beside the town shows faith at the very heart of frontier community life.
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Related people
- · J. B. Harris
- · J. M. Becton
- · J. C. Sharp
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
First United Methodist Church of Rusk
Rusk, TX
Organized in 1849, only a few years after Texas joined the Union, this Methodist congregation in Rusk was first served by circuit-riding minister Henderson D. Palmer, who had been licensed to preach in Nacogdoches County in 1838. Three successive sanctuaries have stood on the same site, from the first frame building of 1851 to the present structure completed in 1920. For well over a century the congregation has anchored community life in this Cherokee County seat.
Cherokee County
Rusk, TX
When Spanish and French explorers reached this region in the seventeenth century, they found Tejas and Hasinai peoples living here, and the Spanish planted missions among them. The Cherokee, driven from the United States, migrated to the area around 1822 and were present during early Anglo colonization before President Mirabeau B. Lamar's administration expelled them in 1839. Formally created from Nacogdoches County in 1846, Cherokee County filled quickly with farms and towns and has since produced two Texas governors, a Wyoming governor, and a Texas House speaker.
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Rusk, TX
In 1853, when Rusk was a young East Texas town, a small band of Baptist worshippers gathered in a private home to organize a congregation, at first sharing a Union Church with local Presbyterians. Over the following decades the fellowship moved, merged with a neighboring congregation, and raised successively larger sanctuaries, from an 1892 one-room frame church to a three-story building in the 1920s. Its story mirrors the slow maturing of a frontier settlement into an established community.
Site of Sam Houston Speeches
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