Chalk Mountain -- Somervell Co TX
N 32° 08.684 W 097° 53.725
14S E 604172 N 3557012
The state historic marker, a church, and a cemetery are all that remains of Chalk Mountain
Waymark Code: WMTRDX
Location: Texas, United States
Date Posted: 01/02/2017
Views: 3
Picturesque and historic Chalk Mountain Cemetery is located in the rolling cross-timbers part of Somervell County. It, and the associated baptist church, are all that is left of a once thriving trading center that got its start in the 1850s.
A historic marker for the cemetery reads as follows:
"CHALK MOUNTAIN CEMETERY
The village of Chalk Mountain originated as a trading center before the Civil War. The earliest burial at Chalk Mountain Cemetery, the only burial ground to have served this community, is that of Abigal Davis (d. 1874), but the presence of unmarked burials indicates possible earlier use. Confederate veteran Hiram Berry Rogers (1840-1929) deeded the cemetery to the county in 1915. Over 350 graves, including those of Rogers and veterans of the Civil War, World Wars I and II, and the Korean War, are interred here. It has been maintained by a cemetery association since 1959. (1991)"
From the Handbook of Texas online: (
visit link)
"CHALK MOUNTAIN, TEXAS. Chalk Mountain, on U.S. Highway 67 near the Somervell county line in southeastern Erath County, was named for a nearby elevation of white rock. Although the J. H. F. Skipper ranch, founded in the area in 1860, may have served as a prewar trading center, the community of Chalk Mountain was not itself established until later. The Chalk Mountain post office, established in 1876 with Elisha D. McCoy as postmaster, was originally in Somervell County. It was moved to Erath County by 1892. By 1890 Chalk Mountain had a gin, a school, and two churches, and by 1900 its population was eighty-one. A Masonic lodge was chartered there in 1904 and occupied the upper floor of a frame commercial building. Chalk Mountain did not prosper because local residents had good road access to Stephenville, and by 1910 its population had fallen to fifty. Its post office closed in 1927. In 1940 the population of Chalk Mountain was sixty-nine, and the town reported two businesses. Its population in 1980 was twenty-five, and meetings were still being held at the Masonic lodge. In 1990 and again in 2000 Chalk Mountain's population was still listed as twenty-five."