First United Methodist Church of Kountze
Kountze, Hardin County, Texas
Marker Inscription
The town of Kountze developed in the 1880s, after the Texas and New Orleans Railroad was built through this area. The county seat, which had previously been located at the town of Hardin, was moved to Kountze in 1886. Soon after the town's creation, a group of worshipers led by the Rev. James S. Murphy joined together to organize a Methodist congregation. Land was acquired in 1887 from P. S. Watts, and plans were made to erect a sanctuary to be used by all denominations. The cornerstone was laid on May 11, 1888, and the first church building in Kountze soon was completed. Worship services were held on alternate Sundays by Methodists and other denominations. Murphy continued to serve as circuit-riding minister to the Methodists until December 1888, when he was succeeded by the Rev. V. A. Godbey. The Methodist Church in Kountze continued to grow over the years. Sunday School and missionary programs were organized, and in 1940 the congregation became a full charge in the denomination, with its own full-time pastor. A new sanctuary was built in 1951 to serve the growing congregation. The church has been a part of Kountze history for over a century.
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
In the 1880s the Texas and New Orleans Railroad opened up the Big Thicket country of Hardin County, and the new town of Kountze grew up along the tracks, capturing the county seat from nearby Hardin in 1886. As settlers arrived, the Rev. James S. Murphy gathered a Methodist congregation that laid the cornerstone of the town's first church in 1888, a sanctuary shared by worshippers of every denomination. Served for years by circuit-riding ministers, the congregation grew into a full charge with its own pastor by 1940 and a new sanctuary in 1951.
Why it matters
Railroad towns like Kountze show how the church often followed the tracks into the American frontier, becoming the first shared institution binding a raw new community together.
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Related people
- · James S. Murphy
- · V. A. Godbey
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Kountze Baptist College
Kountze, TX
Opened in 1910 by the Trinity Valley Baptist Association, Kountze Baptist College — also called Jermany College — offered African American students a primary and secondary education at a time when such schools were commonly styled 'colleges.' Under Professor W.H. Jermany it grew from 15 students in a wooden building to an 81-acre campus with a three-story hall, a working truck farm, a teacher-training program, and courses ranging from mathematics to millinery. Financial strain worsened by the Great Depression forced it to close in 1930, but many of its graduates went on to finish college.
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Founded in 1859 as the first seat of newly created Hardin County, Old Hardin thrived until the Sabine & East Texas Railroad bypassed it in 1881, a fatal turn for many 19th-century towns. A suspicious fire destroyed its courthouse in 1886, and the next year voters moved the county seat to Kountze, which sat on the rail line. Old Hardin faded as the railroad town rose in its place.
Hardin-Concord Road
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In use from about 1859 to 1900, the Hardin-Concord Road was one of the oldest overland routes in the area, carrying wagon and horseback travelers between early settlements. It linked Hardin, the first Hardin County seat, with Concord, the southernmost point steamboats could reach on the Neches River by way of Pine Island Bayou—joining land and water travel into a single network. Traces of the old road can still be followed where modern U.S. Highway 69 now crosses its path.
Lance Rosier
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Born in the heart of the Big Thicket, Lance Rosier grew up in Saratoga soaking in the tales of roughnecks and pioneers at his aunt's Vines Hotel and roaming the surrounding woods. A self-taught naturalist, the man known as "Mr. Big Thicket" guided scientists, photographers, and politicians through the dense East Texas wilderness, mastering its flora and fauna along the way. He helped bridge the region's early conservation efforts, though he died in 1970, just before his dream of a protected national area came true.