Historical Marker
Rocky Creek Baptist Church
Brownwood, Brown County · Texas
Erected 2001
B. J. Collier, one of the founders of the church and its cemetery, is the reason Rocky Creek's first building has a story attached. In 1877 he drove a wagon to Round Rock, Texas, to buy a load of lumber for the church. A hard, cold rain fell on the way home, and he caught pneumonia. He died on December 3, 1877, his fifty-eighth birthday, and was the first person buried in the cemetery on land given by the Cason family.
What the plaque says
Rocky Creek Baptist Church Eighteen people gathered under a brush arbor near Rocky Creek in Brown County on August 18, 1877, to organize a Baptist congregation. They called the Rev. R. L. Baker as their first pastor, and by November began construction of a one-room church building. It was replaced by a larger structure in 1889, and in 1919 that building was destroyed in a storm. The congregation ceased meeting for two years, but in 1921 came together to once again build a new house of worship. The church grew in the ensuing decades, offering a variety of worship, educational and outreach programs. New structures were completed at this site in 1952 and 1983. The congregation continues to serve the community. (2001)
Where it stands
31.76716, -99.08583 · Directions
Worth the stop nearby
- Lake Brownwood State Park — 7.0 miA CCC park on a reservoir that filled in a single flood before its dam was done, with stone cabins, a hilltop dance pavilion and a grand staircase climbed by dancers arriving by boat.
More markers nearby
- Thrifty — 4.0 mi
- Bangs Public Schools — 4.3 mi
- First Baptist Church of Bangs — 4.6 mi
- George Edward Smith — 6.3 mi