Historical Marker
Hopkinsville Lodge No. 183, A.F. & A.M.
Waelder, Gonzales County · Texas
Erected 1978
The lodge moved into a mixed town. Robert Johnson, a blacksmith, was Waelder's first Black businessman, and the Belle Eden School for Black children was open by June 1879. On June 26, 1886, the Colored Masonic Lodge of Waelder was organized on land given by Anderson Price, a well-known landowner. Hettie Manlove Cunningham, one of the first teachers, became in 1888 the first woman pharmacist licensed by the Texas Pharmaceutical Association. Fence cutting brought Texas Rangers under Capt. George Scott in 1883. The town shipped by rail until the last train stopped on June 7, 1958.
What the plaque says
Hopkinsville Lodge No. 183, A.F. & A.M. After migrating from his native Georgia, Dennis Sheffield Hopkins (1819-1917) founded the community of Hopkinsville (5 miles NW) in 1852. He helped organize this Masonic Lodge there in 1855. The thriving village also had a grist mill, gin, several businesses, churches, and a school. When the Galveston, Harrisburg & San Antonio Railroad bypassed Hopkinsville during the 1870s, most residents moved to Waelder. The lodge relocated and built this meeting hall in 1882. Churches, schools, and civic groups have shared use of the structure. (1978)
Where it stands
29.69381, -97.29727 · Directions
Worth the stop nearby
- Lockhart Courthouse Square — 26 miA cotton-era courthouse town named the Barbecue Capital of Texas, built near the 1840 Plum Creek fight that followed the killing of Comanche leaders at peace talks.
More markers nearby
- The Town of Waelder — steps away
- Leander C. Cunningham — 0.6 mi
- Site of Hopkinsville — 4.5 mi
- Mt. Eden Community — 6.4 mi