Fry Homestead

Ladonia, TX

The Baptists of Ladonia trace their beginnings to 1859, when the Rev. Robert Cooke Buckner rode monthly from Paris to preach, and the congregation formally organized in January 1860. In its early years worshipers sat on split logs in a shared church-and-schoolhouse before raising their first building in 1877. The church became a hub of regional Baptist life, even hosting an 1867 convention thinned by a yellow fever outbreak, and its women's missionary groups were active as early as 1869.

Ladonia, TX

Settled around 1840 and first called McCownville after early resident Frank McCown, this Fannin County community was platted with unusually wide streets by carpenter-merchant James H. Cole. Local legend says the name changed in 1857 to honor Ladonna Millsay, a singer traveling by wagon train from Tennessee, and by 1858 a post office made "Ladonia" official. The arrival of the Gulf, Colorado and Santa Fe Railway in 1887 turned it into a booming cotton-marketing town of 2,000 before it slowly declined in the 20th century.

Ladonia, TX

A Presbyterian congregation first organized in Ladonia in the mid-nineteenth century, and between 1910 and 1912 it raised this handsome brick sanctuary, awarding the $6,400 contract to builder W.H. Markley of Commerce. The design is an unusual example of Mission Revival style adapted to a church, prized for its fine detailing and simple, well-proportioned form. Though the congregation dissolved by 1976, the building endured, and its defining central parapet was rebuilt in 1997.

Ladonia, TX

Bethel Lodge began under a dispensation in 1853 and was chartered by the Grand Lodge of Texas in 1854, with Wesley C. Walker as its first worshipful master. Its members were pioneer settlers, many drawn to the new state from the older South, who first met at the Rehobeth community before the lodge moved to Ladonia in the 1870s. After fire and several relocations, the group bought its meeting hall in 1912 and continued as a civic force, absorbing Yowell Lodge in 1961.