After evangelist Abe Mulkey led a 1912 revival at Kosse Methodist Church, city officials decided to build the Kosse Tabernacle to accommodate the town's growing religious needs. The frame building, completed that year for $2,000, featured a gable-on-hip roof, banks of paired windows, a wooden stage, choir platform and pulpit, and a dirt floor. Originally designed for church functions, it quickly became a community gathering place for dances, singings, fraternal organization meetings, and community dinners. In the 1930s, Kosse students attended classes there after the schoolhouse burned. It has also served as a polling place and a refuge for hurricane evacuees, and it has been central to community events in Kosse.