Pine Springs Baptist Church

Pine Springs was also called Fruit. John Demas Ray named it for a large spring in the pines near the school, and orchards were the main livelihood. The Handbook of Texas says the Smith County Canning Company built a factory there in 1891, and a post office called Fruit opened in 1894 with Thomas A. Shamburger as postmaster; it moved to Tyler in 1900. After orchard troubles and the cannery's closing, growers turned to roses and pioneered Tyler's rose industry. In 1903 one school had 139 white students and another 53 Black students.

What the plaque says

Pine Springs Baptist Church In 1881, E. S. Cook and Perry Ray, trustees for the Pine Springs School community, purchased nearby land for the construction of a schoolhouse. Soon after, the Pine Springs Baptist Church of Christ was organized under the direction of the Rev. Marcus Morton Wadsworth (1841-1908), who served as the first pastor. Monthly worship services were conducted in the schoolhouse until a separate sanctuary was built at this site, north of the school, in the early 1890s. About the same time, the congregational name was changed to the Pine Springs Baptist Church. The fellowship experienced steady growth during the pastorate of the Rev. Tully Choice, 1894-1897. The development of the area fruit growing and canning industry brought new members, and a Sunday School and bimonthly services were established. Regular weekly services began about 1935. For over 100 years the Pine Springs Baptist Church has been active in the growth and development of the surrounding area. Members here have included early settlers, soldiers stationed at nearby Camp Fannin during World War II, several pioneers in the development of the area rose industry, and many prominent community leaders. (1981)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Camp Ford Historic Park — 1.0 mi
  A free county park north of Tyler on the site of the largest Confederate prison camp west of the Mississippi, with a kiosk, an interpretive trail and a historical society museum downtown.
• Goodman-LeGrand House and Museum — 4.2 mi
  A Tyler house begun in 1859 as four rooms, enlarged by the Goodman family over 73 years, and left to the city in 1939 with its furnishings, in a garden that fills a city block.
• Tyler State Park — 5.0 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.
• Tyler Rose Garden and Rose Museum — 5.4 mi
  More than 38,000 rose bushes of about 600 cultivars in a free city garden, beside a museum of the Texas Rose Festival, which began in 1933, and of the rose industry.

More markers nearby

• Camp Ford — 0.9 mi
• Major James P. Douglas — 3.4 mi
• Colonel Bryan Marsh — 4.1 mi
• Tyler Tap Railroad — 4.2 mi