Pioneer Rest Cemetery

Adam Bradford, who began the burial ground, kept Menardville's store in 1867, the Handbook of Texas says: a one-room log house, near a blacksmith shop and a saloon and grocery, with all supplies hauled overland from Burnet. The town served as a trading post and overnight stop on cattle trails, and the old Spanish mission compound was used to hold herds bound for market. The San Saba flooded the town in 1899, and residents rebuilt the next year. In 1910 or 1911 railroad officials asked that the town be renamed Menard to make painting signs easier.

What the plaque says

Burial plot was begun by Adam Bradford, who buried his father, Jack Bradford, here in 1863. As the town and cemetery grew, the city bought the tract from Mrs. Gustav E. Schleicher in 1904. Fence surrounding cemetery was built of stone from the old courthouse and jail, razed in 1931, and reputed to have been in the original structure of nearby San Luis de Las Amarillas (Built by the Spanish in 1757). Final resting place for many area pioneers, including soldiers, cowboys, gamblers, preachers, civil war veterans, Indian fighters, and Texas Rangers. (1973)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Presidio de San Saba — 1.2 mi
  The ruins of the largest Spanish presidio in Texas, built in 1757 to guard a mission to the Lipan Apache, where the Comanche and their allies first turned back Spain's frontier.
• Fort McKavett State Historic Site — 20 mi
  The post Sherman called the prettiest in Texas, home to soldiers of all four Buffalo Soldier regiments and then to a town that lived in its buildings until 1973.

More markers nearby

• Fort McKavett, C.S.A. — 0.3 mi
• The Ditch — 0.4 mi
• Puerto de Baluartes (Haven of the Strong Points) — 0.6 mi
• Paso de la Santa Cruz — 0.9 mi