Maysfield United Methodist Church

Four different railroad companies planned track through Maysfield between the 1860s and the 1890s, running from Calvert or Hearne through town to Cameron and eastward into Bell County. None built it. The Handbook of Texas says Maysfield missed the prosperity railroads brought elsewhere, and a good part of its people drifted off; the stage line to Calvert and Cameron was as close as it came. The settlement that had 250 residents in 1884 reported 150 a decade later. Its population then held near 124 for decades, from the mid-1930s through the mid-1960s.

What the plaque says

Maysfield United Methodist Church Though area Methodists met as early as 1847, this church was not formally organized until 1854. Itinerant preachers of the Cameron-Port Sullivan-Maysfield circuit served the congregation, which met in a school building. In 1885, a separate Maysfield circuit was organized, and the Rev. William G. Nelms was appointed pastor. A sanctuary was built in 1897 and stood at this site until destroyed by fire in 1933. The congregation met in the Presbyterian Church until 1952, when the present structure was donated and moved here from Ben Arnold, Texas. Texas Sesquicentennial 1836 - 1986

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Milam County Courthouse and Jail — 8.1 mi
  Cameron's 1892 Renaissance Revival courthouse and the 1895 St. Louis-built jail beside it, now the county museum, are listed together on the National Register.
• Calvert — 12 mi
  A railroad cotton town of 1868 on State Highway 6 that claimed the largest cotton gin in the world and elected Black men to county and state office during Reconstruction.

More markers nearby

• First Presbyterian Church of Maysfield — steps away
• John Hobson — 3.6 mi
• Little River Baptist Church and Cemetery — 3.8 mi
• Steamboat Washington Landed Here — 7.1 mi