Mooreville Cemetery

Mooreville grew quickly and then slowly emptied. The Handbook of Texas says the post office opened in 1878 as Mooresville and was respelled Mooreville in 1892, when the town counted about 180 people, up from 25 in the mid-1880s. It had a store, a gristmill, a gin and a grocery. The San Antonio and Aransas Pass Railway passed four miles east in 1889, which eased access to markets without bringing the town to the tracks. The post office closed in 1906, and the school joined Chilton's district in 1950; the building became a community center.

What the plaque says

Mooreville Cemetery Irishman Robert Moore was the first person to settle permanently in this area. Arriving in the 1850s, he opened a general store on top of a hill south of Cow Bayou. By 1859 several other families lived here and the community became known as Mooreville. Confederate veteran Edward McCullough (1834-1902) came to Morreville in 1865 and later purchased land that included this site. During his ownership this cemetery was established. The graveyard appears to have been used by the community at large from its beginning; the earliest marked graves, which date to 1866, bear surnames of Martin, Grayum, and Russell. The burial ground's existence was first recorded in deed records in 1876, when Edward McCollough deeded land for a burial ground. Since World War II, the historic burial ground has been maintained by the Mooreville Cemetery Association, which was formally established in 1973. The association counts among its members many descendants of Mooreville's original permanent settlers. The Mooreville Cemetery is an important cultural resource in this area. It remains a tangible reminder of this community's pioneer heritage. (1992)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Armstrong Browning Library — 17 mi
  A three-story Italian Renaissance library on the Baylor campus built to hold A. J. Armstrong's Browning collection, dedicated in December 1951 and now, by its own account, the world's largest of Browning material.
• Dr Pepper Museum — 17 mi
  The 1906 bottling plant of the Artesian Manufacturing and Bottling Company, built where Dr Pepper outgrew a Waco drugstore soda fountain, now the Dr Pepper Museum.
• Texas Ranger Hall of Fame and Museum — 17 mi
  The official state repository of Texas Ranger memorabilia, opened in 1968 in Fort Fisher Park on the Brazos, named for a Ranger post of 1837 whose site no one has located.
• Waco Suspension Bridge — 18 mi
  A Brazos crossing opened in January 1870 as the longest single-span suspension bridge west of the Mississippi, tolled until 1889, closed to vehicles in 1971 and now walked.

More markers nearby

• Charles A. Westbrook Plantation — 5.5 mi
• Martin Irons — 5.6 mi
• Site of Bruceville Methodist Church — 6.0 mi
• Bruceville Baptist Church — 6.1 mi