First United Methodist Church

Methodist worship in Beaumont began in 1839 when missionary Samuel A. Williams conducted the first religious service there, followed in 1840 by Henry Stephenson, organizer of the first Protestant church in Texas. Early congregations met under brush arbors, in homes, and in a frame schoolhouse, hearing itinerant riders of the "Alligator Circuit" in this river and bayou region. John Fletcher Pipkin, a lay preacher from across the Neches River, began holding regular services in Beaumont in 1852 and settled there permanently in 1859; during the long intervals between circuit riders' visits, he conducted marriages and funerals for people of all faiths. After a hurricane destroyed the schoolhouse-church building in 1865, poverty in the post-Civil War years delayed replacement until 1877, when Methodists and Baptists jointly built a church. The Baptists moved in 1885 and sold their share to the Methodists, who built a steepled church in 1890, replaced it with a domed building in 1907, and consecrated the present spired edifice in 1968.

Beaumont, Texas · United States