FIRST Burial in Bethel Cemetery - Parker County, TX
N 32° 41.792 W 097° 49.465
14S E 610196 N 3618255
A sign near the front entrance of Bethel United Methodist Church indicates that A.W. Neal was the first to be buried in the cemetery behind the church, back in 1898. The church and cemetery are at 3196 Bethel Rd, southwest of Weatherford, TX.
Waymark Code: WMYDNC
Location: Texas, United States
Date Posted: 06/02/2018
Views: 0
Either the sign is incorrect, or the headstone gets it wrong, indicating that Mr. Neal passed on December 20, 1898. In any event, the monument is appropriate to the 1890s, made of marble and topped by an urn. On the front is the family name, "Neal", and on the plinth on the reverse is an epitaph:
A precious one from us has gone,
A voice we loved is stilled,
A place is vacant in our home,
Which never can be filled.
Mr. Neal and his wife are listed on different sides of the monument:
A.W. Neal
Born
April 22, 1867,
Died
Dec. 20, 1898.
Bettie Elvira
Neal
Born
Nov. 20, 1869,
Died
Oct. 8, 1963.
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A sign near the front entrance provides some history of the church and the cemetery behind it:
The Bethel ("Place of Worship")
United Methodist Church
and Bethel Cemetery
In the spring of 1889 the Bethel Methodist Episcopal Church, South was organized and met in various members' homes until they purchased this site on November 14, 1889 from A.T. Collier and his wife, M.E. Collier, for use as a place of worship and erected a brush arbor under which to meet. In inclement weather they used wagon sheets hung around the sides of the brush arbor for protection. A church building was started, consecrated and then dedicated on October 29, 1899 with John R. Morris, Presiding Elder, and G.E. Cameron, Pastor, officiating.
Services have continued in this same building, with modernizations and additions being made in the ensuing years. Several young men have been licensed to preach from Bethel, including John Neal, Frank Neal, H.D. Huddleston, and the late W.R. Witherspoon of Weatherford.
A.W. (Billy) Neal, the first Sunday school superintendent of Bethel was also the first to be buried in a plot behind the church on December 10, 1898. On August 7, 1899, the church purchased the two and two-tenths acres that is now Bethel Cemetery from Frank A. Blain and his wife, Annie P. Blain, for the purpose of burial sites. Sites are now available from the Bethel Cemetery Association and will be filled in a few more decades by church families and community residents.
FIRST - Classification Variable: Person or Group
Date of FIRST: 12/10/1898
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