Lovelady Evergreen Cemetery
Lovelady, Houston County, Texas
Marker Inscription
The community cemetery dates to the 1870s, when Lovelady was developing as a railroad center for the surrounding agricultural area. Land for the section known as Old Cemetery was conveyed to trustees of the Lovelady Cemetery Association in 1878 and in 1896. The first grave, that of Parham Bridges Baker (b. 1876) is dated 1878. Another early grave is that of Catherine Adams, who also was buried that year. By 1885 there were approximately 20 graves in the cemetery. A good example of an early community graveyard, it is maintained by the Lovelady Evergreen Cemetery Association. (1985) Historic Texas Cemetery medallion (added 2012)
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
As Lovelady grew into a railroad hub for the surrounding farmland in the 1870s, its residents set aside ground for a community burying place, with land conveyed to the cemetery association in 1878 and again in 1896. The first grave, dated 1878, was that of young Parham Bridges Baker, and by 1885 some twenty graves dotted the ground. A textbook example of an early Texas community graveyard, it remains tended by the local cemetery association.
Why it matters
Rural cemeteries like this one are the most durable record left of the pioneer families who settled and farmed the East Texas countryside.
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Related people
- · Parham Bridges Baker
- · Catherine Adams
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Town of Lovelady
Lovelady, TX
Lovelady arose when Houston and Great Northern Railroad investors ran their line through a grant belonging to Cyrus Lovelady, drawing settlers from nearby communities like Nevil's Prairie, Pennington, and Weldon. With its post office, livery, blacksmith, and hotels, the town quickly became a market and shipping point; by 1876 school met in a log house, and an 1881 two-story building was shared by Baptists and a Masonic lodge. Incorporated in 1927, it settled into life as a center for ranching and pulpwood.
First Baptist Church of Lovelady
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Baptist life in Lovelady began with a union Sunday school by 1876, and a Baptist congregation was active by the time the 1879 Neches River association named a pastor from the town. In 1881 the Houston & Great Northern Railroad donated this lot to the church and the Knights of Honor, who shared a two-story frame building — lodge above, worship below. A larger sanctuary followed in 1909, and generations of the founders' descendants have worshipped here since.
Site of Old Town and Post Office of Weldon
Weldon, TX
The settlement began around William Morrow's 1850 cotton gin and gained a post office renamed Weldon in 1869 for pioneer merchant Weldon Jones Murchison. Cotton and timber drove the local economy, with logs hauled by tram road to distant mills by 1900. When the Beaumont & Great Northern Railway arrived in 1911, the whole town picked up and moved south to meet the tracks, prospering despite ruinous fires before its post office finally closed in 1976.
Read's Opening
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This broad prairie was a favored nineteenth-century route to and from the Trinity River before Robert Newton Read and his wife Susan moved here from Arkansas by 1850, giving the landscape its name. The Reads farmed the opening, bought land, ran commercial ventures in Crockett, and donated ground for an African American Presbyterian church east of town. Though the family moved on to Mineola in 1876, Read's Opening remains woven into Houston County's history.