Bynum School

Bynum moved to meet a railroad. The Handbook of Texas says the first store and a post office called Hanover opened in 1882, and a Bynum post office followed in 1886. The town shifted half a mile in 1904 when the Texas and Brazos Valley line arrived, taking its Baptist, Methodist and Christian churches along. The line was nicknamed the Boll Weevil route. A fire destroyed most of the business district in 1925 and a tornado hit in 1930. After the 1949 Gilmer-Aikin laws, schools from Brandon, Prairie Valley, Irene and others joined Bynum's.

What the plaque says

Bynum School The first school in Old Bynum community began in 1880 before the settlement had a name. After a store and a post office were built, the area adopted its name from a nearby creek. The school was moved to the new townsite on the railroad in 1905, and an independent school district was organized. Over the years, the following schools consolidated with Bynum: Davis, Grovecreek, part of Honest Ridge, Pecan, Pierce (1905-1914); Watson (1931); Massey, McMurry (1938); Brandon (1953); and Irene (1958). The school now is a historic reminder of the region's heritage. (1984)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Hill County Courthouse — 8.2 mi
  Wesley C. Dodson's limestone Second Empire courthouse of 1890 on the Hillsboro square, gutted by fire on New Year's Day 1993 and rededicated in 1999 after a rebuilding that two Willie Nelson concerts helped pay for.
• Confederate Reunion Grounds State Historic Site — 35 mi
  Where Limestone County Confederate veterans gathered each summer from 1888, later a water supplier in the Mexia oil boom, now a Texas Historical Commission site on the Navasota River.

More markers nearby

• Old Brandon Mill — 5.8 mi
• Hill County, C.S.A. — 6.0 mi
• Salem Lutheran Church — 6.2 mi
• Abbott — 7.1 mi