Original Site of Bethel Baptist Church
Woodville, Tyler County, Texas
Marker Inscription
First church in county. Organized by Thomas Rock, Milton McQueen, Mrs. Mary Parsons. First pastor was the Rev. J.B. Masterson. Courthouse was used for worship until church was built 1852. Last of old structure was dismantled in 1957. The original bell is now mounted here.
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Organized by early settlers including Thomas Rock, Milton McQueen and Mary Parsons, Bethel Baptist Church was the first congregation in Tyler County. Worshippers met in the courthouse until their own building went up in 1852. The last of that original structure came down in 1957, and the church's first bell is now mounted at this site.
Why it matters
As the county's first church, it marks the earliest institutional life of a pioneer community carving out settlement in the piney woods of East Texas.
Own a business near here? Add it to the map.
Related people
- · Thomas Rock
- · Milton McQueen
- · Mary Parsons
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Home of James Edward Wheat
Woodville, TX
This Woodville house stands on land granted in 1838 to Dr. Josiah Wheat, an early Tyler County settler who later donated acreage for the county seat. William G. McDaniel built the earliest part of the home in 1848, and its gallery over the front porch famously served as sleeping quarters for jurors when housing ran short during court sessions. In 1918 it was bought by Josiah Wheat's great-grandson, attorney James Edward Wheat — a mayor, school-board president, and first chairman of the Texas State Historical Survey Committee — who enlarged the family home.
Tyler County Courthouse
Woodville, TX
Tyler County was carved out of the East Texas piney woods in 1846, the year Texas joined the Union, and Woodville's public square has served as its seat of government ever since. The county replaced its first 1849 courthouse with an eclectic Victorian design of 1892, blending Second Empire, Gothic, and Mediterranean flourishes. A Depression-era WPA remodeling stripped away some of its high-style ornament, yet its central tower still presides over the square.
Tyler County
Woodville, TX
This marker traces Tyler County from its deep past as home ground of East Texas tribes, through a 1756 visit by Spanish explorers wary of French traders, to Fort Teran on the Neches in 1831. When Texas joined the Union, the county was organized in 1846 and named for President John Tyler, who signed the annexation resolution; its seat, Woodville, honored legislator and future governor George T. Wood. Set in the dense wilds of the "Big Thicket," the community grew on timber, oil, and livestock.
Cooper-Reid Home
Woodville, TX
Built in 1850, this Woodville home belonged to Samuel Bronson Cooper (1850–1918), who rose to serve as a United States Congressman from Texas. In 1903 the house passed to S. H. Reid, and the Reid family lived in it continuously for generations before it was restored in the twentieth century. Recorded as a Texas Historic Landmark in 1968, it links a small East Texas town to national politics. The home stands as a well-preserved example of mid-nineteenth-century Texas domestic architecture.