Site of Tenth Street Methodist Church

Homer S. Thrall, who built the congregation's first church, decided to preach in Texas while a student at Ohio University, after reading Martin Ruter's mission letters. He landed at Galveston on November 20, 1842, and rode circuits as large as the Egypt circuit, which took in all or parts of eight counties. He later traced his interest in Texas history to talks with Lamar, Anson Jones and Henry Smith. He wrote five widely read books, among them A History of Texas in 1876 and a History of Methodism in Texas, and willed his 2,300 volumes to Southwestern University.

What the plaque says

Site of Tenth Street Methodist Church Austin Methodists organized in 1840 and began in 1847 worshiping at Congress and 4th Street. This site was purchased in 1853 and a building was begun under the Rev. John W. Phillips (1821-1891). In 1883, the Rev. A. E. Goodwyn (1818-1902) led in the construction of a larger sanctuary. The congregation was known as "Central Church" and "Tenth Street Church". In 1909 it officially changed to "First Methodist Church. Legislators and other government officials worshiped here. The congregation mpved in 1923 to a new building at Lavaca and 12th Street. (1979)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Texas State Capitol — 0.2 mi
  Austin's fourth statehouse, a Renaissance Revival capitol of 1888 that stands 311 feet to its Goddess of Liberty and was restored after the 1983 fire.
• French Legation State Historic Site — 0.5 mi
  A raised pine house built in 1840 and 1841 for France's envoy to the Republic of Texas, who left Austin in a rage over a neighbor's pigs before it was finished.
• Bullock Texas State History Museum — 0.6 mi
  The state's history museum at the head of Congress Avenue, built around the hull of La Salle's ship La Belle, raised from Matagorda Bay with 1.8 million artifacts.
• Texas State Cemetery — 0.9 mi
  A hill east of the Capitol that began with one general's grave in 1851 and now holds Stephen F. Austin, governors, Barbara Jordan and more than 2,000 Confederate veterans and widows.

More markers nearby

• Texas Highway Department — steps away
• The Woman Suffrage Movement in Texas — steps away
• Governor Andrew Jackson Hamilton — steps away
• African Americans in the Texas Revolution — steps away