Lone Pine Baptist Church
Palestine, Anderson County, Texas
Marker Inscription
This congregation traces its history to a small group of worshipers who gathered together in the early 1890s to hold services in a small schoolhouse near this site known as Rocky Point. A plot of land was purchased by the church in 1903, and a one-room frame structure was built for school and church purposes. The one pine tree on the property gave the church its name: Lone Pine Baptist Church. Although the congregation met regularly before then, the church was formally organized on July 8, 1908, with 34 charter members. The Rev. A. M. Thompson was called as first pastor, a position he held until his death in 1911. In 1916 a larger building was erected for the combination church and school. About one year later the two institutions were divided, and a church structure was built in June 1920. Called the tabernacle, it had permanent walls and a roof, but the interior floor was of dirt. Continued growth over the years enabled the congregation to improve the tabernacle and build additional facilities. A new church auditorium was dedicated in 1957. The church continues to serve the community as it has for over eight decades. (1989)
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
This congregation traces its beginnings to worshipers who gathered in the early 1890s in a schoolhouse at a spot known as Rocky Point. When the church bought land in 1903, a single pine tree standing on the property gave it the name Lone Pine Baptist Church, and the congregation was formally organized in 1908 with thirty-four charter members under the Rev. A. M. Thompson. From a dirt-floored "tabernacle" built in 1920 the church grew steadily, dedicating a new auditorium in 1957, and it has served the community for well over eight decades.
Why it matters
The intertwined school and church at Lone Pine show how rural Texas communities built their institutions from the ground up, often under the same humble roof.
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Related people
- · A. M. Thompson
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
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In 1911, three school trustees bought an acre of East Texas farmland and turned an old tobacco barn into a schoolhouse, naming it for four tall pines that framed the entrance. Generations of rural children learned their grades one through eight here, even raising cotton and livestock on the grounds to fund the school's growth. Through a chain of mid-century mergers the little green-and-gold "Pine Burrs" campus evolved into what is now Westwood Elementary, still standing on the same ground.
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