George's Creek Baptist Church

The creek gave the community its name, and the community began as a companion to Fort Spunky, which got its name from fistfights in town. The first settlers, J. H. Chambers and Norv Randle, arrived in 1854. A copper and sulfur mine worked during the Civil War, and by 1888 a silica mine was thriving beside the cemetery. The post office ran from 1876 until rural delivery replaced it in 1939. Since 1892 descendants have gathered at the cemetery tabernacle each year for a cleanup, dinner on the grounds, and a reunion.

What the plaque says

George's Creek Baptist Church The history of the George's Creek community can be traced to two men who passed through the area on an 1841 expedition from the Republic of Texas to Santa Fe, New Mexico. The men, George Barnard and Thomas Torrey, later acquired land in the vicinity. Barnard and his brother established a trading post called Barnardville, which was later renamed Fort Spunky. By 1885, many additional families had arrived in the area, establishing farms, businesses and churches, including Cumberland Presbyterian, Methodist and Baptist congregations. Records indicate two active Baptist churches in George's Creek community in the 1880s: Good Hope and George's Creek. A third Baptist church, Buck Creek, formed near the Nemo community in the early 1890s. In its early years, George's Creek Baptist Church, established in 1885, shared a pastor with the Good Hope congregation. They also shared space with other churches, meeting in the Methodist church building, in schoolhouses, and under brush arbors and tents. In 1905, the church reorganized, and members constructed a tabernacle at the cemetery in 1908. There, they held services and revivals, as well as meetings. They later moved into a sanctuary, which they continue to use today, built by the Holiness Church in 1915. Although records for certain time periods are scarce, the known history of George's Creek Baptist Church indicates more than a century of dedicated worship. Even in times without regular pastors, the congregation maintained a strong Sunday School program. The membership has changed along with the area population, but the church continues to be a spiritual and social center for the community it serves. (2005)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Cleburne State Park — 5.7 mi
  A 1930s Civilian Conservation Corps park on the old Chisholm Trail crossing country, with a spring-fed lake, a hand-carved three-tiered spillway and a CCC bridge in Johnson County.
• Acton State Historic Site — 11 mi
  The smallest state historic site in Texas, a grave plot holding Elizabeth Crockett, widow of David Crockett, under a 1913 statue of a pioneer woman shading her eyes toward the west.
• Dinosaur Valley State Park — 11 mi
  Theropod and sauropod trackways of about 113 million years ago in the bed of the Paluxy River, a National Natural Landmark where R. T. Bird found the first distinct sauropod tracks in 1937.
• Granbury Courthouse Square — 14 mi
  A National Register square of limestone storefronts around W. C. Dodson's Second Empire courthouse, whose clock tower citizens saved after a 1968 tornado.

More markers nearby

• Mitchell Bend Cemetery — 3.9 mi
• Somervell County — 8.1 mi
• Post Oak Community — 10 mi
• Comanche Peak — 11 mi