Tate Cemetery
Arlington, Tarrant County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Evan Calloway Tate (1832-1885) brought his family to this area from Georgia in 1870, establishing the Tate Springs community. Land for this cemetery was deeded to the community by Tate heirs in 1894. At that time there were four marked burials, those of E. C. Tate and three of his children. Other members of the Tate family and the Tate Springs community were later interred here. Many of the graves are unmarked. Care of the cemetery was entrusted in later years to family members of those buried here. A fence and entry arch were erected in 1965. Texas Sesquicentennial 1836-1986
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Evan Calloway Tate brought his family from Georgia to this part of North Texas in 1870, founding the Tate Springs community. When he and three of his children died, the family set aside this ground, formally deeding it to the community in 1894. Generations of the Tate family and their neighbors were laid to rest here, many in graves now unmarked, with descendants tending the site into the twentieth century.
Why it matters
Community cemeteries like this one trace the quiet arc of post–Civil War settlement, preserving the names—and the anonymity—of the families who built rural Texas.
The story behind this marker
AI contextThe era
Texas changed fast in the years after the Civil War. Across the defeated South, families who had lost land, money or hope looked west. Texas, with its vast stretches of cheap or open land, drew them in great numbers. Many of these migrants came from older Southern states like Georgia, Alabama and Tennessee. They brought their farming ways, their churches and their family networks with them.
The country that is now Arlington lay in the prairie and timber lands of Tarrant County, between the growing towns of Dallas and Fort Worth. In 1870 it was still farm country, a scatter of homesteads, springs and crossroads communities. Most of them were named for the families who settled them. The railroad would soon arrive and begin pulling this region toward the crowded metropolis it is today. That transformation was still in the future when the Tates came.
In rural communities of that era, a family burial ground was often one of the first permanent marks on the land. Before churches or schools had buildings of their own, the dead had to be laid to rest somewhere. A small plot near home became the anchor of a community's memory.
People & events
Evan Calloway Tate was born in 1832, which made him a grown man by the time of the Civil War. In 1870 he brought his family to this corner of North Texas from Georgia. Around them grew a settlement that took the family's name: Tate Springs. Springs were precious to settlers, since they meant reliable water, and a community named for one tells you something about why people chose to stay.
Tate lived here only fifteen years after the move. He died in 1885. He was buried in this ground, and so were three of his children. They are a reminder of how often families of that era lost sons and daughters before their time. In 1894 his heirs deeded the land to the wider community. That turned a family plot into a shared burial ground. At the time, the marker notes, there were just four marked graves: Evan Tate's and those of the three children.
Over the decades, more members of the Tate family and their neighbors from Tate Springs were laid to rest here. Many of those graves were never marked with stone, or the markers have since been lost. In later years, the work of tending the cemetery fell to relatives of the people buried in it. In 1965 a fence and an entry arch were put up to define and protect the site. Its historical marker followed during the Texas Sesquicentennial, the 150th anniversary of Texas independence.
Its place in the American story
Small cemeteries like this one are among the most honest records of how America filled in after the Civil War. The big story of that era includes railroads, cattle drives and booming cities. Underneath it are thousands of families like the Tates, who uprooted themselves from the old South, started over on new ground and built communities one household at a time.
The unmarked graves matter as much as the marked ones. Ordinary rural Americans of the nineteenth century often could not afford carved stones. Wooden markers rotted, and records were lost. Historians know that a great many people from this period lie in places like this without names. A cemetery that admits so many of its graves are unmarked tells a truer story than one that seems complete.
There is also a modern lesson here. Arlington grew from scattered farm communities into a major city in the heart of one of the nation's largest metropolitan areas. As that happened, places like Tate Springs were absorbed and largely forgotten. Burial grounds like this one are often the last surviving trace of the settlements that came before the suburbs.
If you visit
Look for the fence and entry arch put up in 1965. They frame the cemetery and mark it off from the city that has grown up around it. Step inside and the setting changes quickly. Even in a busy metro area, an old family cemetery can feel like a pocket of the nineteenth century.
As you walk, notice how much open ground lies between the stones. Many of the people buried here have no visible marker, so tread gently and stay on clear paths. The oldest marked graves, those of Evan Calloway Tate and three of his children, are where the cemetery's story began.
This is a resting place still cared for by descendants, so visit quietly and leave everything as you found it. It makes a reflective stop on any tour of the Dallas–Fort Worth area, and a reminder that beneath today's highways and neighborhoods lie the farms and springs of the families who came 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.
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Related people
- · Evan Calloway Tate
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
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