First Presbyterian Church of Austin

William M. Baker finished Princeton College in 1846 and its seminary in 1848, then served briefly at Batesville, Arkansas. When the Presbyterian General Assembly endorsed the Union during the Civil War, his Austin church left it for the Southern assembly, but Baker was a Unionist, and several families broke with the church. He resigned in December 1865 and moved north to pulpits in Ohio and Massachusetts. In 1866 he published Inside: A Chronicle of Secession under the alias G. F. Harrington, and he wrote twelve novels, most about Texas. He is buried in Oakwood Cemetery beside his father.

What the plaque says

First Presbyterian Church of Austin This congregation traces its history to the early years of Austin and the missionary activities of the Rev. Daniel Baker. After a visit to Austin in 1848, Daniel Baker recommended the organization of a Presbyterian congregation in the city. His son William M. Baker, newly ordained to the Presbyterian ministry, arrived here in May 1850 and organized the First Presbyterian Church. Among the five charter members was master builder Abner Cook, who later built the Texas Governor's Mansion. The first sanctuary, built in downtown Austin on land donated by Cook, was completed in 1851. It was replaced by a stone structure in 1890. The congregation continued to worship at the downtown site until 1960, when they relocated to Jackson Street in north central Austin. The church moved to new facilities at this site in 1978. Historic stained glass windows and the original cornerstone from the 1890 stone sanctuary were incorporated into the design of the new building. The First Presbyterian Church of Austin continues to serve its members and the community with a variety of worship educational and outreach programs. (1990)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Mount Bonnell — 3.5 mi
  Austin's old lookout over the Colorado, named by an 1838 traveler, picnicked on by George and Libbie Custer, and reached by a 1939 flight of about 100 limestone steps.
• Harry Ransom Center — 6.0 mi
  The University of Texas archive where a Gutenberg Bible and the earliest surviving camera photograph are always on view, free, beside the papers of Watergate and the movies.
• LBJ Presidential Library — 6.0 mi
  A ten-story travertine archive on the University of Texas campus holding 45 million pages from a presidency of civil rights laws, the War on Poverty and Vietnam.
• Bullock Texas State History Museum — 6.3 mi
  The state's history museum at the head of Congress Avenue, built around the hull of La Salle's ship La Belle, raised from Matagorda Bay with 1.8 million artifacts.

More markers nearby

• Texas Newspapers, C.S.A. — 1.1 mi
• Balcones Fault Aids Colonization of Texas — 1.2 mi
• Mount Bonnell — 3.4 mi
• Fiskville — 3.5 mi