Isaac Butler "Doc" Cauble (1820-1904) built a cabin in 1850 near one of several flowing springs that had been home to generations of Native Americans. Cauble's young son, James, was a friend to a Comanche boy who died and was buried on the hill that now holds Bold Springs Cemetery. Other early settlers included the families of Carey Boulds, Jacob Closner, Walter Bennett, William Hurlock, and Thomas West. The spring and surrounding community was known as "Bould Springs" or "Bennett Springs." The Bould Springs post office opened in Boulds' cabin, which served as a community gathering place and a stop where stagecoaches changed horses. County commissioners established roads through Bold Springs linking Waco to Hillsboro, to a lumber mill on Aquilla Creek, and to a family grain mill on the Brazos River. Bold Springs Missionary Baptist Church, founded in 1858, was the first church in northeastern McClennan County. The population reached 311 in the 1860 census, making Bold Springs the second largest town in the county. In 1881, settlement shifted to the new town of West, established on the Missouri-Kansas-Texas Railroad. The oldest known grave marks Mary W. Baze (Jul. 28, 1828 - Jun. 19, 1861). The cemetery's landscape is traditional, with graves oriented east-west and the oldest graves in the center sections. Buried there are pioneers of Bold Springs, members of fraternal organizations, early business and civic leaders of West, and veterans of conflicts from the Civil War to the present among more than 2,400 interred. Grave markers are of granite, marble, metal, limestone, and sandstone, and the vegetation includes oak trees, crepe myrtles, irises, and bluebonnets. The Bold Springs Cemetery Association formed in 1892 and continues to care for this historic reminder of the once thriving Bold Springs community.