Allen Cemetery

The cemetery's town began with a railroad agent. In 1870 a purchasing agent for the Houston and Texas Central Railway established the settlement, and in 1872 it was named for Ebenezer Allen, a former Texas attorney general who promoted the line. A post office opened in 1876. The Handbook of Texas repeats the story that Denton outlaw Sam Bass supposedly committed the state's first train robbery at Allen, and it hedges the claim itself. By 1884 the town had three churches, a school, a chair factory and a flour mill, the same year the Odd Fellows opened this cemetery.

What the plaque says

Allen Cemetery Located on land purchased from Mr. and Mrs. John W. Whisenant, this cemetery was formally established on April 5, 1884, by the International Order of Odd Fellows, local Lodge No. 249. Encompassing almost three acres of land, the cemetery has served the Allen community for over a century. The oldest legible grave marker here is that of Rebecca L. Hamilton (d.1883), although local oral tradition holds that earlier graves may exist, including a slave burial ground in the southeast corner of the property. Tombstone inscriptions reveal evidence of early epidemics and include the names of a number of veterans of foreign wars. Robert J. Cuffman (d.1918) was killed in the Meuse-Argonne offensive in World War I. Mahlon Brackney served in the Spanish-American War. Also represented on grave markers here are notable early citizens of the community, including Permelia Ford, a pioneer settler, and Doctors H.N. Compton and William F. Wolford. The Allen Cemetery Association, organized in 1899, cares for the historic graveyard and sponsors an annual Decoration Day. (1988)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Heard Natural Science Museum & Wildlife Sanctuary — 4.9 mi
  A 289-acre sanctuary in McKinney that Bessie Heard founded at the age of 80, with five habitats, a 50-acre wetland and 6.5 miles of trails.
• Rockwall County Historical Foundation & Museum — 17 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.
• Fair Park — 23 mi
  The State Fair of Texas grounds since 1886, where the 1936 Texas Centennial Exposition left one of the country's greatest concentrations of Art Deco exposition buildings.
• African American Museum, Dallas — 23 mi
  Founded in 1974 at Bishop College, a free Fair Park museum holding the Sepia photograph archive, African art and A. Maceo Smith's papers, and the story of the Hall of Negro Life.

More markers nearby

• Allen Station of the Texas Electric Railway — 0.3 mi
• First Methodist Church of Allen — 0.5 mi
• Allen — 0.9 mi
• Allen Water Station — 1.1 mi