Kelsey Mormon Colony

Kelsey is named for Dr. W. H. Kelsey, an early county settler. By 1911 the Handbook of Texas counts five stores, three sawmills, a brick kiln, a cotton gin and a gristmill, plus a red brick public school, Kelsey Academy, staffed by Mormon missionaries. A 1946 county history adds that teachers and young women came from Utah, and that the school had a brass band and a large gymnasium. The Marshall and East Texas Railway ran through from 1910 until it was abandoned in 1917. The post office closed in 1918, and about 350 people lived here in 1938.

What the plaque says

Kelsey Mormon Colony Received church endorsement after Mormon brothers John and Jim Edgar bought a large tract of timber land here in 1898. By end of 1901, Sunday School and church were organized. In Nov. 1902, townsite was laid out by church officials. Post office was located in J. S. Ault store. One-room building served as school and church until 1909, when first church was built (1/10 mi. W). Kelsey Branch was sponsor of Latter Day Saints churches in Enoch, Dallas, Gilmer, Tyler, Longview, Pittsburg, Texarkana, Hooks and Marshall; joined with Enoch, Gilmer churches, in 1958. (1969)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Tyler State Park — 22 mi
  A 985-acre park eight miles north of Tyler, built by the Civilian Conservation Corps from 1935 to 1941 around a 64-acre spring-fed lake, with more than 13 miles of trails.
• Lake Bob Sandlin State Park — 23 mi
  A 1987 state park on a 9,000-acre reservoir, where a Republic of Texas stockade called Fort Sherman stood in 1838 and the Caddo lived from A.D. 800 to 1860, now with fishing piers, trails and cabins.
• Governor Hogg Shrine — 24 mi
  Quitman's 27-acre city park, once a state historical park, where two houses tied to James Stephen Hogg's marriage stand beside an arboretum, a nature walk and the grounds of the Old Settlers Reunion.
• East Texas Oil Museum — 27 mi
  A Kilgore College museum that rebuilds the 1930s oil boom in a full-scale Boomtown with a general store, drugstore and newspaper office, plus dioramas, films and antiques given by East Texans.

More markers nearby

• Kelsey School — 0.4 mi
• Alex Earp — 1.9 mi
• Harmony I.S.D. — 3.9 mi
• Site of Old Gilmer — 4.8 mi