St. Mary's Catholic Church
Ellinger, Fayette County, Texas
Marker Inscription
In the 1850s, families of German and Czech origin in the Ross Prairie area were served by visiting priests. After 1855, they worshipped in a log church (2 miles N) named Saint Joseph, the first permanent Catholic church in Fayette County. The church moved to Live Oak Hill about 1861, and purchased this site near the settlement in 1864. The first resident priest arrived in 1872, and a larger church structure, named Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary (St. Mary's), was built in 1879. After it burned in 1905, this Gothic-styled church was built here now called Hostyn Hill--in 1906. Texas Sesquicentennial 1836-1986.
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
German and Czech families on the Ross Prairie were first served by visiting priests in the 1850s, then gathered after 1855 in a log church called St. Joseph—the first permanent Catholic church in Fayette County. The congregation moved several times before buying this site, welcomed its first resident priest in 1872, and built a larger church in 1879. After fire destroyed that building in 1905, this Gothic-style church rose here on Hostyn Hill in 1906.
Why it matters
The parish's wandering path traces how immigrant Catholics planted lasting roots on the Texas prairie, rebuilding their spiritual home again and again.
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Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Cesko Narodni Hrbitov
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In 1884 Czech immigrants in Ellinger formed a lodge of the C.S.P.S., a national fraternal society that offered mutual aid and benefits to newcomers from the Czech lands. In 1897 the lodge joined Texas counterparts to found the S.P.J.S.T., the Slavonic Benevolent Order of the State of Texas, and the community's Czech National Cemetery became the resting place of early settlers, including a charter member of the order's first lodge. The burial ground preserves the fraternal and communal bonds that sustained Czech families in a new land.
Fayetteville Brethren Church Cemetery
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Brethren Church
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The Rev. Jindrich Juren
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Born in Bohemia in 1850, Jindřich (Henry) Juren studied theology and mastered five languages before immigrating to Texas in 1876 as a newly ordained pastor to Czech-Moravian settlers. Traveling by buggy and train, he ministered to Czech congregations across the state while also teaching public school for four decades. He became a revered leader of Texas's growing Czech community before his burial here in 1921.