Haynie Memorial Methodist Church

Rice's first business building, the Handbook of Texas says, stood two stories tall. An L. B. Haynie ran a general store on the lower floor, and Ed Taber and his wife kept a hotel above. The post office opened in 1872, the year the Houston and Texas Central came through, and a church-school served pupils from about 1875. By 1890 the town had a steam gristmill and gin, three general stores and two groceries, plus a druggist, a blacksmith and two wheelwrights, for an estimated seventy-five residents.

What the plaque says

Haynie Memorial Methodist Church The Rev. William Vaughn founded this church in 1874. The charter members were the families of J. M. Bartlett, B. M. and Mrs. J. A. Clopton, L. B. and W. D. Haynie, W. M. Holmes, J. M. Mitcham, E. E. and I. B. Sessions, and J. A. Ward. This site was donated to the church by W. M. Rice, official of the Houston & Texas Central Railroad and founder of Rice University, Houston. The present building, erected in 1908 and named in honor of steward W. D. Haynie, was dedicated in 1909, in the pastorate of the Rev. H. B. Henry, by Bishop Seth Ward. (1976)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Petroleum Industry Park — 11 mi
  The pipes and drilling tower mark where a city water well struck oil on June 9, 1894, the start of the first Texas field to produce oil and gas in important quantities.
• Ellis County Courthouse — 23 mi
  J. Riely Gordon's courthouse of 1897 in Pecos red sandstone and pink granite, with twenty-one carved stone faces and two cornerstones left by a quarrel over its building.

More markers nearby

• Rice — steps away
• First Baptist Church of Rice — steps away
• Rice Cemetery — 0.8 mi
• Alma — 3.9 mi