St. Mary's Parish
Hallettsville, Lavaca County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Considered the oldest rural Catholic parish in Texas, St. Mary's was settled before the Texas War for Independence by such pioneers as James Brown, who was killed in the siege of the Alamo. First church edifice for St. Mary's was built in 1840 under influence of missionary Fathers George Haydon and Edward A. Clarke, who also opened school for the settlement. This was one of ten churches comprising Texas' first diocese (Galveston) at its formation in 1847. Many priests' and sisters' vocations have come from this historic parish. (1971)
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Remembered as the oldest rural Catholic parish in Texas, St. Mary's was settled by pioneers even before the Texas Revolution — among them James Brown, who died in the fall of the Alamo. Its first church rose in 1840 under missionary priests George Haydon and Edward A. Clarke, who also opened a school for the fledgling settlement. When Texas gained its first diocese at Galveston in 1847, St. Mary's stood among its ten founding churches, and it has since sent many men and women into religious vocations.
Why it matters
The parish anchors the deep Catholic and immigrant roots of Texas, reaching back to the turbulent years when the region passed from Mexico to independence to statehood.
Own a business near here? Add it to the map.
Related people
- · James Brown
- · George Haydon
- · Edward A. Clarke
Related events
- · Battle of the Alamo
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Brown School
Hallettsville, TX
When Benedict Brown deeded land in 1894 for a public school in the tiny farming community of St. Mary's, he joined a county that already scattered some 85 small schools across its farms. The first one-room schoolhouse was built from lumber hauled by wagon from Flatonia, furnished with rough benches and hand-held slates, with drinking water carried in daily from a neighbor's farm. For the German and Czech immigrant families nearby, this modest room was a fierce commitment to their children's education, and the school grew steadily until it consolidated away in 1958.
Vysehrad School
Hallettsville, TX
Established in 1887, Vysehrad School took its name—meaning "high castle"—from the Czech heritage of the farming families who settled Lavaca County. Frank Jakubik taught the first classes before the original building burned in 1905 and was replaced by a two-room schoolhouse. Through decades of growth and consolidation with neighboring schools, Vysehrad endured as an independent district serving more than thirty square miles.
Stacy School
Hallettsville, TX
As waves of German and Czech immigrants settled Lavaca County near the turn of the 20th century, the county carved out rural school districts to teach their children. The Stacy School — named for landowner J.B. Stacy, who set aside the original site — grew from an 1880s private school into a two-room frame schoolhouse with a stage for plays, a windmill for water, and games of marbles and "mumbly peg" at recess. For most of its 58 years a single teacher handled six grades and about forty students; enrollment peaked at 54 during World War II before rural consolidation closed it in 1954.
Murchison Lodge No. 80, A.F. & A.M.
Hallettsville, TX
Considered the oldest organized group in Lavaca County, this Masonic lodge was chartered in 1851 and named for early Texas colonist and Masonic leader John Murchison. Around 1855 it built a three-story hall that did triple duty as a church and a school known as the "Masonic College." A lodge member, Friench Simpson, later served as grand treasurer of the Grand Lodge of Texas in 1900.