Houston County, Texas
Grapeland is home to 25 official Texas Historical Commission markers — each one telling a piece of the city’s story. Browse the markers below, then find them on the map and discover more nearby with RoadHistorical.
Was founded near this marker May 24, 1690, at the Nabedache (Tejas) Indian Village ----------------- Erected, A. D. 1934, by DeZavala Chapter, Texas Historical and Landmarks Association. ----------------- Located by:…
View on map ↗First Spanish Mission in East Texas. Established in 1690 by Franciscan friars to convert the Tejas Indians. "Tejas", a Spanish rendition of the Indian word for "friend", was in time adopted as the state name. The…
View on map ↗In area settled about 1850. Founded 1872 by International & Great Northern Railway investors. Named for rank wild grapevines. Post office opened May 26, 1873. Log schoolhouse, used also for church services, was first…
View on map ↗Congregation organized about 1870 in community of Red House (3 mi. east), where Indian village had once stood. When Grapeland was founded with coming of railroad in 1872, church moved to town; at first held services in…
View on map ↗Joseph Redmond Rice (1805-1866) cut timber; then his young wife, Willie Masters Rice (1809-1881), snaked the logs to a homesite 16 miles southwest of here. the cabin they built was a noted way-station on the San Antonio…
View on map ↗(April 1, 1847 -- January 31, 1911) Alabama native Franklin Columbus Woodard settled in this area with his parents about 1850. After being educated as a teacher, Woodard graduated from medical school in 1887 and later…
View on map ↗John and Lucinda (Nugent) Sheridan left North Carolina in the mid-1820s and became two of Houston County's first permanent settlers. John (Apr. 5, 1796 – May 10, 1837), a former Texas Ranger, was killed by Indians in…
View on map ↗Built in 1889 as a dog trot cabin with four rooms, this house originally served as the residence of the Henry Allen Pennington family. Houston County native Pennington (1853-1925) and his wife, Mary (Beeson)…
View on map ↗(Jan. 31, 1817 -- Mar. 26, 1867) A native of Louisiana, Joseph Randolph Yarbrough served in the Texas War for Independence from Mexico and was assigned to guard the camp opposite Harrisburg during the Battle of San…
View on map ↗Willis Parker arrived in this area from North Carolina in the 1850s. Many of his relatives later joined him in Texas. Upon Willis Parker's death about 1857, his parents Ralph R. and Sarah C. Hodge Parker set aside land…
View on map ↗Pioneer settlers began arriving in this area in the late 1830s. By the late 1850s a rural community known as Trinity Chapel had built up. Thomas Jefferson Fox and his family established a farm here in the late 1880s.…
View on map ↗The final resting place of many Houston County pioneers, this cemetery has been in continuous use since the 1850s. It is located on four acres of land donated by Lucinda C. Sheridan Murchison (1808-1862), widow of early…
View on map ↗A fine example of rural union churches, this building has served a number of denominations in the Augusta Community. It also served as a schoolhouse in the community's early years. Probably built in the 1850s, the…
View on map ↗(May 20, 1815 -- September 14, 1883) A native of Illinois, Darius H. Edens moved to Texas in 1831. He served in a Texas army infantry unit commanded by Thomas J. Rusk in 1836. A surveyor by trade, he worked in present…
View on map ↗At 552 feet above sea level this oblong knoll rises to the highest elevation in the area. Known as Houston's Mound as early as the 1830s, it afforded Native Americans, pioneers, and soldiers a view of the surrounding…
View on map ↗Balis Edens was born in 1805 in South Carolina, the son of John Edens and his wife Lavinia Langford. The family moved to Texas in 1831, and in 1834 John Edens received a league and labor of land in the David G. Burnet…
View on map ↗Cedar Branch Community School The first written record of a school for the children of Cedar Branch appears in the Houston County Judge's Report of 1888. When the members of Cedar Branch Church constructed a new…
View on map ↗Chaffin Cemetery Established c. 1840s Historic Texas Cemetery - 2002
View on map ↗Reuben (1805-1859) and Sarah Parker (1807-1852) Brown came from Illinois to settle here in 1833. Their oldest son, John (1837-1921), lived his entire life within a mile of Old Fort Brown, his birthplace. In 1865, when…
View on map ↗Alabama native Joseph A. (also Joe, Jo or Josephus) Parker settled in East Texas by 1847. In October of that year, he wed Nancy Ann Allen in Cherokee County. The Parkers were living in Houston County by 1850, and the…
View on map ↗Bobbitt Cemetery Established 1876 Historic Texas Cemetery - 2005
View on map ↗Established Ca. 1862 Historic Texas Cemetery - 2009
View on map ↗This church served the freed slaves of the Percilla, Augusta and Glover communities. A small wood-framed church was built in 1880 and served as the church building until 1906. This first location on Percilla Road also…
View on map ↗As Baptists from surrounding rural communities began to move to the thriving railroad town of Grapeland, the need for a Baptist church in town led to the establishment of this congregation in 1891. Services were held in…
View on map ↗Organized in 1848 as Friendship Baptist Church, this congregation was housed in a small wooden structure on this site. The people called the Rev. S. F. Wall in 1868. Minutes from the 1875 meeting of the Neches River…
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