Ables Springs

The settlement's main business was religion. In 1878 the Ables family deeded about nine acres to the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, as a campground, and the Handbook of Texas says a writer in 1915 noted the community's "old-fashioned religious camp meetings." A tabernacle, church, school and cemetery shared the ground. The spring that once flowed there is dry now, and the Handbook adds that few people ever settled on the spot. The supplemental plaque corrects the founder to James Ables and moves his father's land grant to 1838, though the Handbook still says 1848.

What the plaque says

Ables Springs This small settlement, which lies in a region of natural springs, was named for an early Kaufman County family. James W. and Eliza (Godfrey) Ables moved to this area in 1853 and settled on land granted to his father, Ezekial Ables, in 1848. The Ables were active Methodists who, in 1878, deeded nearly nine acres of their land to the Methodist Episcopal Church, South. A church building, a tabernacle, and a public school were built on the land. Part of the site was set aside for this cemetery. The oldest marked grave here is dated 1880. Never the scene of much commercial activity, Ables Springs has remained a quiet, rural settlement throughout its history. Besides the Methodist congregation, Church of Christ and Baptist fellowships also have been organized here. Prior to World War I, the community had an active Woodman of the World Lodge. The tabernacle on the Methodist church property has been the site of many religious camp meetings, and the school played a vital role in the community until its consolidation with other school districts. A reminder of the early settlement in northeast Kaufman County, Ables Springs is an important part of the area's pioneer heritage. (1985) supplemental plaque: Marker should read James Ables (1829-1891), not James W. Ables (1860-1944). James's father, Ezekiel, received Nacogdoches land grant number 25 in 1838, not 1848.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• No. 1 British Flying Training School Museum — 11 mi
  A free museum at Terrell's airport where about 2,200 RAF cadets learned to fly between 1941 and 1945, with logbooks, uniforms, letters and original training aircraft.
• Rockwall County Historical Foundation & Museum — 21 mi
  A small museum in Harry Myers Park that keeps the evidence on Rockwall's rock wall, sandstone dikes that geologists call natural and folk tales call built.
• Audie Murphy / American Cotton Museum — 22 mi
  A Greenville museum of Hunt County's military heroes, including Audie Murphy, and of cotton, which keeps the engine of what it says was the world's largest inland cotton compress.

More markers nearby

• Quinlan — 6.7 mi
• Poetry Baptist Church — 7.1 mi
• Captain Henry W. Wade — 7.2 mi
• Poetry Methodist Church — 7.4 mi