First United Methodist Church of Del Rio
Del Rio, Val Verde County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Six individuals met on September 23, 1882 to create the Methodist Episcopal Church South, the forerunner of First United Methodist Church of Del Rio. These first congregants were Randolph Pafford,J. Lyman Bailey, William M. Bailey, Sarah Bailey, Rosalie Roberts and William G. Hancock. During the earliest days of the congregation’s existence, church meetings were held in the homes of members. Pafford donated a town lot and $500 to the church in 1883, and a wood-frame structure was soon erected on cemetery street (now Pecan street), on what was then the northern edge of town. Growth of the congregation was modest into the 20th century, and a stone chapel was constructed in 1903-1904. The congregation grew to slightly greater than three hundred members by 1917, as members opened their homes to soldier trainees at Camp del Rio, later known as Camp Michie. Continued growth of the congregation created the necessity for another, larger facility, and the first service in the new building was held on may 31, 1931. The larger sanctuary was well justified, as the congregation doubled in size to over seven hundred members between the world wars. The growth of the city and the opening of laughlin air force base facilitated the enlargement of the membership to more than nine hundred during the 1960s. In 1968, the Methodist Church and Evangelical United Brethren Church merged into the United Methodist Church. The church has promoted missions and charitable work after numerous hurricanes, as well as abroad in Mexico and Liberia, and also provides numerous outreach programs throughout the local community. (2008)
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Six settlers organized a Methodist congregation in the border town of Del Rio in 1882, meeting first in members' homes before building a frame chapel on the edge of town. The church grew with the city—swelling as soldiers trained at nearby Camp Michie during World War I and again with the opening of Laughlin Air Force Base—and today carries on missions at home and abroad.
Why it matters
The congregation's growth mirrors the story of a Texas border town shaped by ranching, the railroad, and the military.
The story behind this marker
AI contextThe era
Del Rio in 1882 was a young settlement on the Texas side of the Rio Grande, in the country that would become Val Verde County. The border region was shaped by ranching, by the river that gave it life, and increasingly by the railroad that was pushing west across Texas in these very years. It was a place where a town could take root quickly if enough determined people willed it into being.
The 1880s belonged to the Reconstruction and Gilded Age, a period when Anglo-American settlement spread across the last stretches of the Texas frontier and communities organized themselves institution by institution. As with so many frontier towns, one of the first things a handful of settlers did was gather to worship — establishing a congregation often came before there was even a building to house it.
Over the following decades, as Del Rio grew from a border outpost into an established town, the fortunes of its congregations tracked the fortunes of the community: modest at first, then swelling as ranching, the railroad, and — decisively — the military brought people to this corner of the border.
People & events
It began with six people. On September 23, 1882, Randolph Pafford, J. Lyman Bailey, William M. Bailey, Sarah Bailey, Rosalie Roberts, and William G. Hancock met to organize the Methodist Episcopal Church South, the forerunner of today's First United Methodist Church of Del Rio. In those earliest days they met in one another's homes, as new congregations so often did.
Randolph Pafford gave the young church its footing, donating a town lot and $500 in 1883, and a wood-frame structure soon rose on what was then the northern edge of town. Growth was modest into the new century, and a stone chapel followed in 1903–1904. Then the wider world arrived: as soldiers trained at Camp Del Rio — later known as Camp Michie — during the First World War era, members opened their homes to them, and the congregation grew to slightly more than three hundred by 1917.
From there the church's story becomes one of steady expansion. A larger building held its first service on May 31, 1931, and between the world wars the congregation doubled to over seven hundred members. The opening of Laughlin Air Force Base helped push membership past nine hundred in the 1960s. In 1968 the national merger of the Methodist Church and the Evangelical United Brethren Church made it a United Methodist congregation.
Its place in the American story
The growth of this single congregation reads like a chronicle of what shaped the American border and, indeed, much of the American West: ranching and the railroad first, and then, again and again, the military. Each surge in the church's membership — the World War I trainees, the between-the-wars doubling, the Air Force base in the 1960s — marks a moment when national events reshaped a local community.
That pattern is deeply American. Across the twentieth century, military installations transformed quiet towns into places of national consequence, and the churches, schools, and businesses of those towns grew to meet the influx. Del Rio's Methodists welcoming soldiers into their homes is a small, human version of a story that played out wherever the armed forces set down roots.
The congregation's outward reach extends the story further still. Its record of missions and charitable work — responding after hurricanes and serving abroad in Mexico and Liberia, along with local outreach — links a border-town church to the wider currents of American religious life and its long tradition of service beyond its own walls.
If you visit
Del Rio rewards travelers curious about the layered history of the Texas–Mexico border, and this congregation offers a way into that story. As you consider the site, keep in mind how far the church has moved and grown since six people first met in a private home in 1882 — from a frame structure on the edge of town to a stone chapel to a far larger sanctuary.
The marker's timeline is worth reading closely, because it doubles as a timeline of the town itself: the railroad era, the World War I trainees at Camp Michie, the between-the-wars boom, and the arrival of Laughlin Air Force Base. Each date is a clue to what was happening on the border in that decade.
If you're exploring Val Verde County, let this stop set the frame for the whole region — a border town shaped by the river, the ranch, the rails, and the military. Take a moment with the founders' names on the marker; they're a reminder that a thriving congregation of hundreds began with just a half-dozen determined people.
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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Themes & tags
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