Blue Mound United Methodist Church and Cemetery - Denton, TX
N 33° 17.630 W 097° 10.739
14S E 669556 N 3685341
The Blue Mound Cemetery is between the Blue Mound United Methodist Church and the old Blue Mound schoolhouse, now a community center, at 8421 N Interstate 35, Denton, TX.
Waymark Code: WMXVFK
Location: Texas, United States
Date Posted: 03/02/2018
Views: 2
While the church has a nice
website, they do not provide any history. Interestingly, this is the general area of where the Blue Mound community once was, surviving today as a rural community with this church, the adjacent cemetery, and the old school building next to the cemetery. The
Denton County History Page and
The Handbook of Texas Online together provide a fairly good overview.
The community was established in 1876 by Herman Christian Barthold, Sr. (who is buried here), and ultimately named for the bluebonnets that are the official state flower of Texas today. As the settlement grew, they established a school, a German Baptist church, and a German Methodist church. As one might expect, there was also a Lutheran church, but it was in Krum, not too far from here.
The church itself dates to the 1890s, although this is a modern building. Services were conducted in German until 1938, no doubt influenced by the coming of World War II.
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There are a few headstones in the cemetery which, despite bearing names of obvious German heritage -- the namesake for nearby Ganzer Road is here with his descendants -- feature German inscriptions, and one example is the headstone for Simon Grabbe, and his wife, Marie. They share a gray, granite headstone that is typical of the early 20th century. Atop the headstone is the family name, "Grabbe", along with this inscription:
Zu errinnerung [sic]
An
Simon Grabbe
Geb. D.19, Aug. 1836
Gest. D.2, Okt. 1914
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Zu errinnerung [sic]
An
Marie Grabbe
Geb. Rauch
Frau von Simon Grabbe
Geb. D.16, Aug. 1852
Gest. D. 15, Jan. 1904
Note the typo on "zu errinnerung", which means "to blush." It should be "zu erinnerung", "To the Memory".