Stiles Cemetery
Big Lake, Reagan County, Texas
Marker Inscription
(One mile west) Established about 1903. Site is on land then owned by early settlers G. W. and Lizzie Stiles. Plot summarizes much frontier history, as it holds graves of cowboys who died in accidents on cattle range; one Spanish-American War veteran; victims of shootings, rattlesnake bites, epidemic dysentery. Most were pioneers of steady habits and quiet lives. Already in use for many years, the 3-acre plot was deeded to county in 1920 by J. D. Wagner, an adventuring man who lived for years alternately in Texas and in South America. (1970)
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Established around 1903 on the ranchland of settlers G. W. and Lizzie Stiles, this three-acre cemetery reads like a frontier chronicle. Its graves hold cowboys killed in range accidents, a Spanish-American War veteran, and victims of shootings, rattlesnake bites, and a dysentery epidemic—though most, the marker notes, were pioneers of quiet and steady lives. The plot was deeded to the county in 1920 by J. D. Wagner, a wanderer who split his years between Texas and South America.
Why it matters
Stiles Cemetery preserves the everyday hardships and hazards of West Texas ranching life, where sudden accident and disease shaped the fate of the cowboys and settlers who opened the range.
The story behind this marker
AI contextThe era
Around the turn of the twentieth century, the plains of what became Reagan County were cattle country. The land was wide, dry and thinly settled. Ranching dominated, towns were few, and a trip to a doctor could take a day or more. The county was organized in the early 1900s, and a burial ground like this one was often among the first community institutions such a place created.
Life on the open range had hard edges. Cowboys worked with half-wild cattle and horses far from help. Rattlesnakes were a constant danger in the brush and rocks. Before modern sanitation, and with water sources that were not always safe, epidemic illnesses such as dysentery could sweep through a small community with deadly results.
This was the late frontier. The Indian wars were over and the railroad age had arrived, but West Texas still offered the dangers and isolation of an earlier time. The Stiles Cemetery grew up in that setting.
People & events
The cemetery began around 1903 on land owned by early settlers G. W. and Lizzie Stiles. That was common on the frontier: when someone died, families buried them close to home, and a private plot gradually became a community's burial ground. Neighbors used the Stiles land for years before it became public.
The graves here tell the region's story. Some belong to cowboys killed in accidents on the cattle range. There is a veteran of the Spanish-American War, and there are people who died from shootings, rattlesnake bites and an epidemic of dysentery. The marker is careful to add, though, that most of those buried here were not dramatic figures. They were pioneers of steady habits and quiet lives. That distinction is a thoughtful one, because the frontier was built mostly by ordinary people doing ordinary work, not by gunfights.
In 1920 the three-acre plot was deeded to the county by J. D. Wagner, whom the marker describes as an adventuring man who spent his years moving back and forth between Texas and South America. It is an intriguing detail. By giving the land to the county, he ensured the graves of these ranch hands and settlers would be protected long after the families who first used it were gone.
Its place in the American story
Frontier cemeteries like this one are among the most honest records of the American West. Films and novels tend to focus on gunfighters and cattle drives. A burial ground shows the full picture: the accidents, the illnesses, the snakebites, the occasional violence, and mostly the quiet lives of people who stayed and worked the land.
The Spanish-American War veteran buried here connects this isolated corner of Texas to a turning point in national history. The 1898 war marked America's emergence as a world power, and men from small ranching communities served in it and then returned to ordinary lives on the range.
The cemetery also marks a moment of transition. Within a couple of decades of its founding, Reagan County became famous in the oil industry, and the region's economy and landscape changed dramatically. The Stiles Cemetery preserves the ranching era that came before that boom, when the land was valued for grass and water rather than for what lay beneath it.
If you visit
The marker notes that the cemetery lies about a mile west of where it stands, so plan to look for the burial ground itself if you want the full experience. Treat it as the sacred place it is: move quietly, stay on the paths and leave everything as you found it.
Take time among the older stones. Some may be weathered or simple, and some graves may not be marked at all. Try to imagine the community that gathered here to bury a cowboy thrown by his horse or a child lost to fever, with open range country stretching away on every side.
Big Lake sits along the highway corridor of the Permian Basin plains, and this cemetery makes a thoughtful stop on a drive through West Texas. It offers a quiet counterpoint to the region's oil history, a reminder of the settlers and ranch hands who were here first.
Written by AI to add context, grounded in the marker’s inscription and the historical record. The inscription above is the original, unaltered text.
Own a business near here? Add it to the map.
Related people
- · G. W. Stiles
- · Lizzie Stiles
- · J. D. Wagner
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Stiles Courthouse
Big Lake, TX
Built in 1911 from stone quarried just half a mile away at a cost of $20,000, this courthouse served the county until 1925, when the seat of government moved to Big Lake. In the years that followed it found new life as a community center and, for a single year, a school.
Site of the First Court House Built in Reagan County
Big Lake, TX
When Reagan County was carved out of the vast West Texas ranchlands and organized in 1903, its first slate of officials took office in a courthouse on this site, deep in the sparsely settled Permian Basin. The roster of judge, clerk, sheriff, surveyor, and commissioners reflects the machinery of frontier self-government taking root on the open range. In 1925 the county seat moved to Big Lake, and the state marked this founding spot in 1936 during the Texas Centennial.
Reagan County
Big Lake, TX
Reagan County was carved from Tom Green County and organized in 1903 as ranching and, later, oil pushed settlement across the West Texas plains. It honors John H. Reagan (1818-1905), an Indian fighter, surveyor, and long-serving Texas congressman who became Postmaster General of the Confederacy and later a founding force of the Texas Railroad Commission. The county seat moved from Stiles to Big Lake in 1925.
John E. Gardner Place
Big Lake, TX
This mud-mortared house of native stone is the oldest in Reagan County, a plain and practical dwelling built without window glass — its openings closed instead by swinging shutters. It survives as a rare witness to how the first families made a home on the arid West Texas range, using only the stone at hand.