Bethel United Methodist Church and Cemetery - Parker County, TX
N 32° 41.795 W 097° 49.413
14S E 610277 N 3618263
The Bethel United Methodist Church and Cemetery are at 3196 Bethel Rd, in the Bethel community, just a few miles southwest of I-20 and Weatherford, TX.
Waymark Code: WMYDTD
Location: Texas, United States
Date Posted: 06/03/2018
Views: 2
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.
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Be certain to take a look at the interesting configuration for the Woodmen of the World and Woodmen Circle monuments for J.C. King and his wife, Laura, who died a day apart from each other in 1918: That wasn't a good year for the Spanish Flu, and they might have been casualties. Their Woodmen monuments are joined at the top by a log.
An interesting headstone that shows a sense of humor is the one for Ralph W. Mosier. His modern, red granite headstone has "Criminal Investigator" across the top, with the seal of the State of Texas superimposed upon the state itself. It reads:
Ralph W. Mosier
Sept. 27, 1934
Oct. 28, 1983
In God We Trust
Everyone Else
We Investigate