Pecan Cemetery

Purves is explained two ways. The plaque says the community grew up around a blacksmith shop owned by James Purves. The Handbook of Texas says the town was named for William M. Purves, its first postmaster, and for John Purves, who established a church in 1890. It gives the post office dates as 1897 to 1907 and the population as 117 in 1900. By 1947 there were ninety-five residents, two businesses, two churches and a school, and by 1980 only fifty. Neither text says how these Purveses were related, and the description assumes nothing.

What the plaque says

Pecan Cemetery The Pecan Cemetery traces its history to 1880. The oldest marked grave is that of Horace F. Adams (October 19-November 14, 1880), son of Isaac (1842-1931) and Mary (1855-1915) Adams, who are also buried in the historic graveyard. A memorial marker for Civil War casualty Daniel Turney (1829-1864) bears the earliest death date, although he is actually buried in Tyler. His family placed the memorial at his wife's grave site in the 1960s. The cemetery contains a number of 19th-century graves. It was the primary burial ground for residents of the Purves Community, which grew up around a blacksmith shop owned by James Purves. Friendship Baptist Church, located near the cemetery, served the community from 1884 until it disbanded in 1915. The building was torn down in 1922 and the material was used to build a tabernacle at Pecan Cemetery. Funerals were held in the tabernacle, and on annual special days families gathered there for refreshment while working in the cemetery. The Pecan Cemetery Endowment Corporation was formed in 1961 to provide perpetual care for the graveyard. (1992)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Dublin Bottling Works — 8.2 mi
  The Erath County plant that bottled Dr Pepper with cane sugar from 1891 until a 2012 settlement ended its Dr Pepper license, and that still makes its own sodas the same way.
• Hamilton County Courthouse — 22 mi
  A limestone courthouse of 1886-87 on the Hamilton square, built after the county's 1878 courthouse burned, enlarged in the early 1930s and rededicated in 2012 after restoration.
• Dinosaur Valley State Park — 31 mi
  Theropod and sauropod trackways of about 113 million years ago in the bed of the Paluxy River, a National Natural Landmark where R. T. Bird found the first distinct sauropod tracks in 1937.

More markers nearby

• Edna Hill Community — 5.6 mi
• Carlton Cemetery — 6.7 mi
• Clairette Cemetery — 7.0 mi
• Hogan Blacksmith Shop — 8.1 mi