Miles Methodist Church

The town was named for settler Jonathan Miles, who gave $5,000 toward extending the railroad from Ballinger to San Angelo, the Handbook of Texas says, and it has also been known as Miles City. It had 814 people in 1940 and 650 people and nineteen businesses in 1960. Its restored opera house was placed on the National Register in 1976, and other old buildings, including the country store, have been restored. In 1980 Miles had a post office, a bank, several businesses and 720 people, and it grew to 850 by 2000.

What the plaque says

In a small grove of trees beside a deep spring-fed pool known as China Mott, the Methodists of Miles built a tabernacle of willow and brush in 1891, shortly after the birth of Miles itself. Brother Smith, a circuit rider from Navarro County, was their pastor. In 1895, several groups began meeting for worship in a schoolhouse on Baptist Hill. The first small section of a church building was erected on this site in 1901. In that year, the Women's Missionary Society began the fundraising and educational efforts which would make them instrumental in the history of the church. The first religious building in Miles, the Methodist church became a center for public gatherings such as the Christmas celebration of 1903. In 1915 a southern addition, steeple, and bell tower were added onto the building. Ellison Hall was created for Sunday School and community meetings. Destroyed by fire in 1963, the church buildings were replaced with a brick structure by January 1964. With an annual return to China Mott since the late 1980s, a monthly fellowship night (held since the 1930s), youth programs, and community worship, Miles United Methodist Church continues its tradition of service. (1998)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Carnegie Library of Ballinger — 17 mi
  A 1909 limestone library with an Ionic portico in a railroad town the Santa Fe created in 1886, one of the few Texas Carnegie libraries still working in its original building.
• Miss Hattie's Bordello Museum — 18 mi
  The upstairs rooms on Concho Avenue where a brothel ran from 1902 until the Texas Rangers closed it in 1952, shown on short guided tours with most of the furnishings original.
• San Angelo Museum of Fine Arts — 18 mi
  A free art museum on the Concho beside Fort Concho, founded in the fort's 1868 quartermaster building and known nationally for its biennial ceramics competition.
• Fort Concho National Historic Landmark — 18 mi
  The stone post at the forks of the Concho, headquarters of the Tenth Cavalry from 1875 to 1882, saved by a woman with a museum and now a city-run landmark of 23 original buildings.

More markers nearby

• Rowena — 8.5 mi
• Sons of Hermann Lodge No. 216 — 8.8 mi
• Tennyson — 12 mi
• San Clemente Mission — 15 mi