South MacArthur Church of Christ
Irving, Dallas County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Church of Christ worship services were being held in this area as early as 1890. In 1903, a sanctuary was completed on land donated by the town's founders, and the congregation adopted the name South Delaware Church of Christ. In 1948, some members of the South Delaware Church began the East Side Church of Christ. The two congregations merged in 1972 and adopted the present name. South MacArthur Church of Christ has continued to uphold the ideals and traditions of its founders, with emphasis on Christian education, evangelism, and community service. Texas Sesquicentennial 1836-1986
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Church of Christ services were held in the Irving area as early as 1890, and in 1903 a sanctuary rose on land donated by the town's founders, taking the name South Delaware Church of Christ. A daughter congregation formed in 1948, and the two reunited in 1972 under the present name. The church's history mirrors the growth of a farming settlement into a Dallas-area city.
Why it matters
The congregation traces the community life of early Irving, showing how settlement-era churches endured and merged as North Texas towns grew into suburbs.
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Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
St. Luke Catholic Church
Irving, TX
Catholic worship in this area dates to the 1860s, when Mass was said in private homes; by tradition, early parishioners even pulled the seats from their buggies to serve as Sunday pews. When Irving was founded in 1903, its developers donated a town lot for the Catholic church, and St. Luke's first frame sanctuary rose the next year. The congregation grew steadily through three churches, attaining parish status in 1947 and adding a school and convent in the 1950s.
Old Kit Cemetery
Irving, TX
Near the forks of the Trinity River, mid-1800s settlers built the little community of Gorbit, later renamed Kit, complete with a store, a post office, and the merchant-postmaster Ike Story. The cemetery began in 1896 when a family passing through buried their sick child in a grove on David Britain's land, and Britain donated the ground for a community burial place and an adjoining church lot. Early settlers stepped off their own plots by eye, and today Civil War–era veterans, immigrant French, German, and Belgian families, and pioneers like Aunt Kit King rest here as Irving has grown up around them.
Kit Community
Irving, TX
John W. and Jestine Gorbit farmed here by 1850, and a settlement called Gorbit grew up around them as a stop on a pre–Civil War postal route. After Ike Story opened a store and post office in 1889, confusion with a similarly named town led to the settlement being renamed Kit in 1894, and residents added a cemetery and schools. When the railroad town of Irving was founded nearby in 1903, Kit's businesses, churches, and post office drifted to the new townsite, and by the 1940s the community had faded into the growing metropolis.
Site of the Dr. D. W. Gilbert Homestead
Irving, TX
Mississippi-born Daniel Webster Gilbert trained under his physician brother before earning a medical degree in St. Louis and returning to Texas in 1881. From an office on his hilltop homestead he served the scattered communities around what became Irving, later farming with progressive methods, running the Gilbert Dairy, and training pharmacists. When Irving was platted in 1903 he moved his practice into town and helped organize its bank, doctoring there until his death in 1930.