Newman Community and Cemetery
Sylvester vicinity, Fisher County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Jim Newman, one of Fisher County's earliest settlers, established a ranch in this area about 1879. The community that developed near his ranch was named Newman when the county's first post office opened here in 1881. The town consisted of the Old Newman and Union Hall Schools, a post office/grocery store, and the Newman Baptist Church by 1901. The Newman Cemetery was legally set aside in a deed conveying property at this site for cemetery purposes in 1906. The first persons buried here were Miller Phigpen and J. E. W. Scott in 1906. Among the sixteen veterans of various wars buried here is American Civil War veteran R. L. Creswell. The Methodist Episcopal Church built a sanctuary here about 1908. Union Hall and Old Newman schools consolidated in 1913, and in 1924 a new brick schoolhouse was constructed. In 1929 the Methodist Episcopal and Baptist churches erected new sanctuaries. A steady decline in the area's population resulted in the dissolution of the Methodist Church in 1940, the school in the early 1940s and the Baptist Church about 1950. Vestiges of the town's church and school structures and the still active Newman Cemetery are all that remain of the former town of Newman. (1993)
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Rancher Jim Newman, one of Fisher County's earliest settlers, established a spread here around 1879, and the community that grew nearby took his name when the county's first post office opened in 1881. By the early 1900s Newman had schools, churches, and a store, and its cemetery—set aside in 1906—holds sixteen veterans, including Civil War soldier R. L. Creswell. As population steadily declined, the churches and school closed one by one, leaving the still-active cemetery as the town's last trace.
Why it matters
Newman charts the familiar rise and fall of a frontier ranching town, its cemetery preserving the memory of a community that farming consolidation ultimately erased.
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Related people
- · Jim Newman
- · R. L. Creswell
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
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