First Baptist Church of West

Carey Boulds settled at Bold Springs before 1852, and a post office opened at his cabin that year, the Handbook of Texas says. In 1856 the family of Walter Wyatt Bennett moved into the cabin and became the first permanent residents. The 1860 census counted 311 people. The present town of West was laid out in 1881 on the railroad and named for Thomas M. West, a landowner and merchant who became its postmaster in 1882. The old settlement faded as the new town grew, and the church moved with it.

What the plaque says

First Baptist Church of West Founded in 1858 in the pioneer settlement of Bold Springs, this church developed under the leadership of postmaster and farmer Alberto Vaughn and 32 charter members. The congregation erected a frame church building south of the settlement. In 1882, the fellowship moved to the west, at the corner of Spruce and Pine, when a rail line was built to the town. The first church building at this site was constructed in 1899. After it burned in 1938, the present sanctuary was built. For over 100 years the church has played a vital role in the community life of West. (1983)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Hill County Courthouse — 14 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.
• Waco Mammoth National Monument — 15 mi
  A bone bed on the Bosque River where a nursery herd of at least 19 Columbian mammoths was trapped and drowned by floodwater 65,000 to 72,000 years ago, left in place under a dig shelter.
• Waco Suspension Bridge — 17 mi
  A Brazos crossing opened in January 1870 as the longest single-span suspension bridge west of the Mississippi, tolled until 1889, closed to vehicles in 1971 and now walked.
• Texas Ranger Hall of Fame and Museum — 17 mi
  The official state repository of Texas Ranger memorabilia, opened in 1968 in Fort Fisher Park on the Brazos, named for a Ranger post of 1837 whose site no one has located.

More markers nearby

• The Crash at Crush — 0.3 mi
• West — 0.3 mi
• First Presbyterian Church of West — 0.3 mi
• Church of the Assumption — 0.5 mi