Kiowa Cemetery
Booker, Lipscomb County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Named for the nearby creek, Kiowa Cemetery served the residents who settled here in the early 20th century. The community consisted of Russians of German descent whose families began settling in Russia in the mid-1700s, during the rule of Catherine the Great. In 1910, several of these German-Russian families settled on the Kiowa Creek south of Booker; they soon established a Lutheran church. Charter members of the church included the Meller, Bechthold, and Littau families; all are represented in this burial ground. The first internment, of Abraham Littau, occurred in 1912. In 1916, Leonhard and Katherine Littau donated property for use as a cemetery. Today, descendents of the interred care for this burial ground. Historic Texas Cemetery - 2007
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Kiowa Cemetery holds a community of German-Russians—descendants of Germans who had settled the Russian steppe under Catherine the Great in the mid-1700s. Around 1910 several of these families settled along Kiowa Creek south of Booker, where they soon built a Lutheran church, and the burial ground took its first grave, Abraham Littau, in 1912. In 1916 the Littau family deeded the land for a cemetery still tended by the descendants of those buried there.
Why it matters
The cemetery marks one leg of a remarkable double migration—from Germany to Russia and then to the American plains—that carried German-Russian farmers into the Texas Panhandle.
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Related people
- · Leonhard Littau
- · Katherine Littau
- · Abraham Littau
Related events
- · German-Russian immigration
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
St. John's Lutheran Church Cemetery
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Among the earliest homesteaders of Lipscomb County were German-Russians—Germans whose families had farmed the Russian empire before coming to America—including Jacob and Amalia Koch. They belonged to St. John's Evangelical Lutheran Church, founded by these settlers in 1914, and by 1916 the Koch family let the congregation use their land for burials, formally deeding it in 1950. The first grave, baby Hildegard Schilling in January 1916, began a cemetery that still links the county to its German-Russian heritage.
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