Start with dense marker clusters
- Wise County Courthouse square
- Downtown Decatur
- Old trail and road corridors
- Cemetery and church markers
Wise County, Texas
Historical Markers in Decatur, Texas
Decatur is a Wise County marker hub where courthouse history, cattle and trail routes, frontier settlement, churches, cemeteries, and old commercial roads remain close to the square. The city works well as a stop on a northwestern DFW drive because the markers are compact enough to preview and revisit in one outing. Decatur has 42 official Texas Historical Commission markers in Wise County. The marker list includes records dating to 1936. Common marker themes include courthouse and civic history, churches, cemeteries, and community institutions, railroad, trail, and transportation history. Use this page to preview the markers, then open RoadHistorical on your drive to see nearby stops on the map, listen to narration, and save the places you want to visit.
Best starting areas in Decatur
Route ideas near Decatur
- Pair Decatur with Denton for a North Texas courthouse route.
- Continue west toward Weatherford for frontier and cattle-trail context.
What you will find in Decatur
- Courthouse and civic history
- Churches, cemeteries, and community institutions
- Railroad, trail, and transportation history
- Ranching, farming, and frontier settlement
- Military, battle, and Texas Revolution sites
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Butterfield Overland Stage Line · 1936
Through Decatur passed the Butterfield Overland mail line connecting St. Louis and San Francisco with semi-weekly stage and mail service, 1858-1861. The length of the route, 2,795 miles and the superior service…
View on map ↗El Castile (Old Waggoner Home) · 1962
1000 E. Main St., Decatur
View on map ↗Wise County, C.S.A. · 1963
County named for Henry A. Wise, U.S. Senator from Virginia who supported Texas annexation, later Governor and C.S.A. general. Wise County was part of District One of 33 brigade districts of Texas established to recruit…
View on map ↗Decatur Baptist College · 1964
Decatur Baptist College, world's first institution to be planned (in 1898) as a junior college. This hall was built in 1892, for an earlier school.
View on map ↗Wise County Courthouse · 1964
Texas Historical Building Medallion
View on map ↗Randolph Vesey · 1965
(1832-1908) Respected Negro citizen and homeowner. Champion pioneer fiddler, popular at Forts Belknap, Griffin and Richardson and over county. Once when he was an Indian captive, held in Kansas, Texans sent ponies to…
View on map ↗Battle of the Knobs · 1967
On November 10, 1837, a company of eighteen Republic of Texas soldiers led by Lt. A. B. Benthuysen engaged in a battle with approximately 150 Indians near this site. Ten Texas soldiers were killed in the battle, and the…
View on map ↗Old Campsite of Jesse and Frank James · 1967
Famous western frontier outlaws, who had many Texas hideouts along a line from the Rio Grande to the Red River. The camps - extending into Missouri, their home state - were used for hiding stolen horses until posses…
View on map ↗Texas Ranger Captain Ira Long · 1967
(May 5, 1842 - March 8, 1913) Dedicated and courageous. Born in Indiana; reared in Missouri. Wounded twice in Confederate service during the Civil War. On reorganization of Texas Rangers, 1874, was commissioned first…
View on map ↗Anneville School · 1968
Located on 3-acres donated in 1883 by E. M. Curtner, N. E. Young, P. H. and N. C. Neal for a cemetery, school, and church. First school (a 2-story building) was 30 yards west of cemetery. First church was about 300…
View on map ↗Cattle Trail Crossing · 1968
Near this site ran one of the many "feeder" branches of the famous Chisholm Trail, best-known of all the cattle trails that once linked the vast grasslands of Texas with the meat-hungry markets of the north. The…
View on map ↗Episcopal Mission of the Ascension · 1968
Oldest original church building in Decatur. Consecrated by great missionary bishop, the Rt. Rev. A. C. Garrett. Erected facing Main Street (2 blks. W. of square) in 1889. Known as "The Little Church with the Crosses",…
View on map ↗Old Stone Prison · 1968
First stone house in Decatur. Erected by prison labor about 1859. Main house was residence of sheriff or deputy. Basement was used as jail. Meals were sent down a dumb-waiter located outside the east end of the house.…
View on map ↗Sam Woody's Cabin · 1970
Tennessee pioneer Sam Woody (1826-1920) migrated to Texas in the 1840s. He brought his family to Wise County in 1854. This cabin, located near Deep Creek, was the first dwelling in the area. After Woody cut the logs,…
View on map ↗Site of Wise County Poor Farm & Cemetery · 1971
Operated 1885-1962 to support and employ dependent or needy citizens and as place for county convicts to work out fines. First superintendent of the 320-acre farm, R. Suffert, managed all land and activities and his…
View on map ↗Charles Vernon Terrell · 1972
A leading public man in Texas, 1896-1939. Born in Wise County to early (1854) settlers. After two years at Texas A & M, read law and began practice in 1886. Served 1888-92 as Decatur City attorney; 1892-96 as county…
View on map ↗Flat Rock Cemetery · 1972
Settled in 1850s by Moses Ball and other pioneers. Tradition says first burial here was an Indian; the second, a small girl who died while her family was migrating through the area. Oldest tombstones are dated 1878.…
View on map ↗Gose Trees · 1973
Remnant of bois d'arc hedge which encircled the log cabin of Stephen M. Gose (1824-77), early justice of the peace, blacksmith, and leader of Methodist church, who came to Texas from Missouri in 1859. The spiny trees,…
View on map ↗S. W. Tilghman House · 1974
Born in Gibson County, Tennessee, S. W. Tilghman (1846-1913) came in 1870 by wagon train to Wise County. In 1872 he married a Decatur native, Eliza Bland Miller (1856-1931), and became father of a daughter and three…
View on map ↗Wise County Reunion · 1976
The Confederate veterans of Wise County are said to have held occasional reunions in the 1860s-1870s. Old settlers invited both the Confederate veterans and Wise County pioneers to an 1881 reunion at Cold Springs. This…
View on map ↗Dr. William Renshaw · 1977
Born in Illinois, William Renshaw studied medicine and set up practice in Sparta, Tennessee. His wife Sarah received from the Mexican government a grant of land in Texas, where her father Samuel Worthington lost his…
View on map ↗Randolph (Uncle Ran) Vesey · 1979
(1832-1908) Born a slave near Savannah, GA., Randolph Vesey was body servant to Confederate General William Lewis Cabell during the Civil War. In 1868, while living on the Montague-Wise County line, Vesey was captured…
View on map ↗Decatur First United Methodist Church · 1981
Organized in 1862, this congregation is the oldest in Decatur. The Reverend J. R. Bellamy conducted the first services in a vacant store on the south side of the town square. Other churches were not started in the…
View on map ↗Wise County Messenger · 1981
Started by William Forster in 1880, the "Messenger" was published in Paradise (10 miles southwest) and Alvord (11 miles northwest) before a permanent move to Decatur in 1885. Early editions included poems, love stories,…
View on map ↗First National Bank of Decatur · 1983
This financial institution was organized in 1883 by Decatur bankers Dan Waggoner, Henry Greathouse, and other pioneer businessmen. Waggoner's son, W. T. Waggoner (b. 1854), a prominent Texas cattleman and oilman, served…
View on map ↗Oak Grove United Methodist Church · 1984
This congregation was organized in 1878 with fourteen charter members by the Reverend Jim Smith and the Reverend E. C. Fullingim. In 1880 the church became part of the Decatur circuit, and the Reverend R. N. Brown…
View on map ↗Oak Lawn Cemetery · 1991
Oak Lawn Cemetery was officially established in 1878 when William T. Perry deeded property to R. M. Collins, the mayor of Decatur, for a public burial ground for area residents. At that time however, at least one marked…
View on map ↗Texas Tourist Camp Complex · 1994
Local businessman E. F. Boydston (1888-1945) purchased this site, a former feed lot, in 1927 for $400. Recognizing a potential business opportunity in offering services to the traveling public, he built a wooden shed…
View on map ↗Waggoner Cemetery · 1994
Georgia native the Reverend Henry Fullingim, his wife Martha, and their 17 children came to northeast Texas in 1849. Henry Fullingim served the area as a circuit-riding Methodist minister. Their son, Archibald, and…
View on map ↗Rush Creek Community Cemetery · 1997
Named for a stream that flowed through the area, the community of Rush Creek contained a school, two churches, and a cemetery. The oldest recorded burial is that of Harry Houston, infant son of John and Mary Houston,…
View on map ↗Preskitt Cemetery · 2000
The land around this site was deeded to the trustees of the Lee School Community, one of whom was M. W. Preskitt, in April 1885. In August of the following year, the Lee School trustees deeded half that parcel to County…
View on map ↗First Baptist Church of Decatur · 2006
Organized in 1856 under the Rev. J.T. Willis, the church first met in the log cabin of Samuel Perrin in Taylorsville, now known as Decatur. From early on, members were active in the town. By the late 1880s, the Rev.…
View on map ↗Trimble Cemetery · 2009
TRIMBLE CEMETERY TRIMBLE CEMETERY WAS THE MAIN BURIAL GROUND USED BY THE RESIDENTS OF THE TINY COMMUNITY OF FLATWOOD (ALSO KNOWN AS DAVIS CITY) THAT EXISTED DURING THE LATE NINETEENTH CENTURY. THE CEMETERY IS NAMED FOR…
View on map ↗New Salem Freewill Baptist Church · 2012
IN APRIL 1893, REVEREND JOSEPHUS WESLEY FORD AND WIFE, JAMES ALEXANDER FORD AND WIFE, RICHARD S. FORD AND WIFE, JESSIE GARRISON AND WIFE AND SISTER JESSIE L. PHILLIPS ORGANIZED THE NEW SALEM FREEWILL BAPTIST CHURCH…
View on map ↗St. John Missionary Baptist Church · 2012
ST. JOHN MISSIONARY BAPTIST CHURCH THIS HISTORIC CHURCH FORMED IN THE SPRING OF 1882. A GROUP OF WOMEN, LED BY MISSOURI BROWN, BEGAN A SUNDAY SCHOOL AND LATER INITIATED THE ORGANIZATION OF A NEW CHURCH. THE FIRST CHURCH…
View on map ↗East Side Elementary School · 2013
In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Wise and several surrounding counties had few African American citizens. Yet regulations at the time required separate facilities for African Americans. Most African American…
View on map ↗Perrin Log Cabin · 2013
William Perrin and his wife, Charlotte, along with two other families, left Rock Castle, Kentucky in the fall of 1853, arriving forty days later in the Peters Colony near Dallas. They moved west again, arriving in Wise…
View on map ↗Colonel Absalom Bishop · 2014
COLONEL ABSALOM BISHOP ABSALOM BISHOP (1804-1883) BEGAN HIS MILITARY SERVICE AS A CAPTAIN OF MILITIA IN THE SEMINOLE WAR IN FLORIDA. HE LATER ATTAINED THE RANK OF COLONEL. BISHOP LIVED IN SEVERAL STATES BEFORE ARRIVING…
View on map ↗Greenwood Masonic Lodge #779 · 2016
In 1895, members of the fraternal organization, the Freemasons, petitioned the most worshipful Grand Master of the Grand Lodge of Texas to establish a Masonic Lodge in their community. The lodge was chartered on…
View on map ↗Pleasant Grove Cemetery #1 · 2018
FM 730 South at County Road 4280-NW corner of intersection
View on map ↗Depression Era Projects in Wise County · 2019
Northwest corner of S. Trinity Street and Pecan Street
View on map ↗Glass Manufacturing in Wise County · 2020
marker pending
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Nearby historical-marker cities
Keep exploring near Decatur
- Alvord historical markers11 markers in Wise County
- Paradise historical markers7 markers in Wise County
- Bridgeport historical markers13 markers in Wise County
- Aurora historical markers4 markers in Wise County
- Rhome historical markers4 markers in Wise County
- Chico historical markers11 markers in Wise County
Keep exploring