First Baptist Church of Groesbeck

Groesbeck's story begins before the church. The Handbook of Texas says Elisha Anglin received part of the Varela survey in 1835 and that the railroad reached the site in 1870. The town was named for Abram Groesbeeck, a railroad director, though the station kept his original spelling. Groesbeck was incorporated in 1871 and enjoyed a brief railroad boom, but its population fell by 1880 and for a time the incorporation was dropped. It replaced Springfield as county seat in 1874, and the first building put up there was a jail. The Journal began publishing in 1892.

What the plaque says

First Baptist Church of Groesbeck When Groesbeck was founded in 1871, on Houston & Texas Central Railroad, Old Springfield (5 mi. NW) was bypassed. Some Baptists from the church founded there in 1846 moved here. Visited by William Carey Crane, J. B. Link, Z. N. Morrell and other great preachers, they organized this church in 1876. Growth mounted during events such as 10-day revivals held in 1880s by evangelist W. E. Penn. Early member L. L. Foster became a Texas Railroad Commissioner and president of Texas A.& M. Old Springfield Bell was used with 1914, 1950, and 1967 buildings. (1972)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Old Fort Parker — 2.8 mi
  A rebuilt 1830s family stockade near the Navasota River, where a May 1836 attack killed men of the Parker settlement and took five captives, among them nine-year-old Cynthia Ann Parker.
• Confederate Reunion Grounds State Historic Site — 7.6 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.
• Blind Lemon Memorial Cemetery — 19 mi
  The Freestone County grave of the Texas blues singer Blind Lemon Jefferson, who recorded for Paramount in Chicago from 1926 and died there in December 1929.

More markers nearby

• Home County of Lafayette Lumpkin Foster — 0.3 mi
• Zada Jane Sanders Kelly — 1.8 mi
• Civilian Conservation Corps at Fort Parker State Park — 4.6 mi
• Thornton Schools — 8.0 mi