Lamar County, Texas
Paris is home to 47 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.
Created December 17, 1840 from Red River County. Organized in 1841. Named in honor of Mirabeau B. Lamar, 1798-1859. Father of Texas education. President of the Republic of Texas 1838-1841. Lafayette, 1841, Mount Vernon,…
View on map ↗Site of Lafayette -- First county seat of Lamar County - A clapboard courthouse was built by John Lovejoy on 40 acres donated by John Watson - Here court was held June, 1841, to June, 1843 - John A. Rutherford, chief…
View on map ↗(Star and Wreath) Native Kentuckian, West Point graduate, brevetted for gallantry in Mexican war, district attorney from Lamar County, Major General C. S. A. in Tennessee and Mississippi campaigns, commander of Indian…
View on map ↗Built 1876 by Judge Wm. Henry Lightfoot, veteran of Forrest's Cavalry in Civil War; law partner of Gen. (and U. S. Senator) Sam B. Maxey. Lumber was hauled from Jefferson. Has square nails. Wide board pine floors are…
View on map ↗Of uneasy border of Indian Territory in the Civil War. A military transport center, on the Old Central National Road surveyed in 1844 by the Republic of Texas, to run from San Antonio, crossing Red River north of Paris.…
View on map ↗Alabama native Henry William Lightfoot a Confederate veteran of Forrest's Cavalry, came to Paris in 1872 as a law partner of Sam Bell Maxey. Two years later, he married Maxey's adopted daughter, Dora Rowel Maxey, and…
View on map ↗Built 1858 as story and a half home by early doctor, A. S. Johnson. Remodelled 1907. Occupied in 1916 by Dr. L. P. McCuistion (1869-1947), 57 years a physician, who founded the sanitarium of Paris in 1914 and led in…
View on map ↗This site marks the first call for survey of the city of Paris, Republic of Texas, 1844. Geo. W. Wright, early settler, soldier in Texas War for Independence, congressman of the Republic, donated 50 acres of land for…
View on map ↗(1824-1884) Cattle baron whose herds, moving from east to west Texas and into New Mexico, expanded into one of the greatest cattle spreads in the west. Coming from Tennessee to Paris, 1837, Chisum joined S. K. Fowler in…
View on map ↗Designed as a military highway, intended to make linkage with United States military road built to the north of the Red River in the 1820s. This was part of the national effort of Republic of Texas to open a good road…
View on map ↗Organized 1861 by the Rev. John Anderson. Odd Fellows Seminary and a downtown shop were sites of early worship. Congregation built first sanctuary in 1874. Architects for this church (built 1891) were L. B. Volk and…
View on map ↗(January 3, 1833 - April 9, 1919) Outstanding Baptist minister. Born in Tennessee, he moved to Texas 1859, and became pastor of this congregation in 1861. A new church building was erected here, and through his…
View on map ↗Organized and opened for business at its present location in 1886 by William J. McDonald (1844-1926), Civil War veteran and lawyer. Earlier he had opened the Citizens Bank of Clarksville and in 1889 he established a…
View on map ↗Built about 1890 by Jethro D. Atkinson, bank director and owner of Paris' first shoe store. Bought 1910 by social leaders, Dr. Eugene Felder Morris and wife Elizabeth. A fine example of Victorian style prevailing here…
View on map ↗Organized 1867; one of founding churches (1872), Zion District Baptist Association. Original pastor, the Rev. Elisha Barnes (1811-95), served 20 years, led congregation to build (about 1876) its first church. The Rev.…
View on map ↗Although Paris was founded in the mid-1840s, many of its historic structures were lost in a fire that destroyed almost half the town in 1916. The blaze started about five o'clock on the afternoon of March 21, 1916, at…
View on map ↗(1793 - Dec. 12, 1870) A veteran of the War of 1812, Virginia native George W. Stell, Sr. came to Texas in the late 1830s. A farmer, surveyor, and builder, he constructed the first courthouse in Paris after it was named…
View on map ↗Although attempts to provide a public school system in Paris were made as early as 1877, it was not until 1884 that the system as it is known today was organized. Under the strong leadership of Mayor John C. Gibbons, W.…
View on map ↗This Paris landmark was built between 1908 and 1910 for the family of prominent businessman Rufus Fenner Scott, Sr. (1848-1932). Designed by German-born architect J. L. Wees, who is responsible for many of the town's…
View on map ↗The beginning of this congregation can be traced to 1843, when the Rev. James Graham organized the First Methodist Church in the area. It later took the name Centenary Methodist Episcopal Church, South. Meanwhile,…
View on map ↗This small rural church was organized in 1868 by John A. Fuller with about twelve members. Early worship services were held at the Methodist church building and in the local schoolhouse. Joseph Givens, for whom the…
View on map ↗The history of schools in Biardstown is closely associated with the Biard family, early settlers of the area. The first school in the community was in the log home of William Washington Biard. In 1867 John Wilson Biard,…
View on map ↗Five Paris businessmen founded the Lamar County Fair Association in 1911: Guy S. Caldwell (1875-1937), C. J. Musselman (1884-1951), John C. Gibbons (1895-1936), Rube Wells (1859-1951), and Dr. M. L. Maxwell (1865-1939).…
View on map ↗The old city cemetery is located on land once owned by George Washington Wright (1809-1877), founder of the city of Paris. The oldest grave here is said to be that of a free black man who worked for Wright. Although the…
View on map ↗In 1911 the Catholic bishop of Dallas, Joseph Patrick Lynch (1872-1954), beseeched the Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word to administer St. Joseph's Infirmary in Paris. The congregation, based in San Antonio and…
View on map ↗John Winn Harrison (1865-1940) came to Paris from Alabama in 1886. Working as a carpenter for several years, he formed a construction company in partnership with Cornelius G. Caviness in the 1890s. Becoming an…
View on map ↗Fire protection in Paris dates to the early 1870s, when a group of businessmen led by Willet Babcock organized a volunteer fire company. Known as Phoenix Fire Company No. 1, the volunteer unit continued in operation…
View on map ↗Recognizing in 1940 that hosting peacetime draftees might revive the county's economy, the city of Paris sent a request for the army to build a training camp here. The local American Legion acquired land options.…
View on map ↗The 1845 charter establishing Paris Lodge No. 27 was the last charter issued by the Grand Lodge of Texas during the Republic of Texas period. The lodge was organized by George W. Wright, founder of Paris, as a refuge…
View on map ↗This congregation, established during the Republic of Texas period, was organized as the First Cumberland Presbyterian Church on November 4, 1844, by the Rev. Samuel J. Corley, a circuit-riding minister. The first…
View on map ↗(March 16, 1853 - September 27, 1932) Born in Cincinnati, Ohio, John James Culbertson grew up in large northeastern cities. He married Emily Lou Lee of New Jersey in 1882 and soon became a salesman for a cotton product…
View on map ↗The March 1916 fire that left downtown Paris in ruins ravaged Lamar County's massive 1897 Romanesque courthouse and tower, once thought indestructible. On April 20, 1916, the Lamar County Commissioners Court chose local…
View on map ↗Shady Grove Cemetery According to an account by Dr. J.E. Fuller (1862-1940), as reported by local historian Ed H. McCuistion (1867-1946) in a 1921 column in The Paris News, the first person buried here was a youth with…
View on map ↗One of eight children, Travis Clack Henderson was born in Alabama on June 24, 1836 to John Henry and Minerva Bernard Henderson. In 1856, he moved to Paris, Texas, and established himself as a farmer. He joined the local…
View on map ↗Attempts to bring rail service to Lamar County began in the mid-1800s, but a line did not reach the city of Paris until one was built to the south side of town in 1875. Residents raised money to entice the St. Louis &…
View on map ↗In 1854, the Rev. Willis M. Pickett and six charter members formed the Union Baptist Church of Paris. Remaining in its original location, the church grew dramatically, eventually becoming First Baptist Church. Many…
View on map ↗CAMPBELL CEMETERY ESTABLISHED 1843 HISTORIC TEXAS CEMETERY – 2012
View on map ↗The Evergreen Cemetery is the final resting place for many notable citizens of Paris and Lamar County. Due to the steady growth of the area, the old cemetery of Paris, located near the center of town, quickly became too…
View on map ↗In the early 1880s, cotton began to dominate Texas agriculture as a principal cash crop, with over two million cultivated acres producing 800,000 bales of cotton per year. With the 1876 arrival of the first railroad…
View on map ↗Following emancipation, several Paris black free men and women formed informal congregations to practice their new spiritual rights. These former slaves found Baptist theology, with its egalitarian notion of redemption…
View on map ↗On March 21, 1916, a fire swept through Paris that consumed 264 acres and 1,440 buildings and killed three people. Property loss was estimated at $11 million. Paris was founded in the mid-1840s, and many of the town’s…
View on map ↗The marker will be place facing Church Street on the southeast corner of the property.
View on map ↗North end of Lamar County Courthouse Parking Lot which is bounded by North Main Street, Graham Street and NW 1st Street
View on map ↗Southwest corner of 8th Southwest and Bonham Streets
View on map ↗Levin Vinson Moore (1809-1899) brought his family to this area from Tennessee in 1836. They established a farmstead near a natural spring, and soon were joined by eleven other families from the southern United States.…
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View on map ↗Henry P. Mayer, a member of the Paris Independent School District Board of Education, proposed the establishment of a junior college in Paris in 1992. He quickly gained the support of the community, as many leading…
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