First Anglican Church Service in the Callahan Area

Alexander Charles Garrett (1832-1924), a native of Ireland, came to Canada as an Anglican Missionary. Later he moved to San Francisco, and then to Omaha, Nebraska. In 1874 he was sent to Dallas as bishop of the Northern Missionary District of Texas. Here he served an area of 100,000 square miles, traveling mostly on horseback or in horse-drawn vehicles.

Captain John Trent, born 1839 in South Carolina, moved to Texas from Tennessee in 1875 with wife, children, and other relatives. The family built a log house here at Tecumseh Peak and raised sheep and cattle.

Going to market in Dallas, Captain Trent met Bishop Garrett, who offered to visit him at his ranch. In a first effort the Bishop lost his way, but the next year found the homestead. Neighbors thronged in, and on February 23, 1878, an Anglican service was held "for the first time in these wild mountains."

Later Bishop Garrett was presiding bishop of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States. On the centennial of his birth (1932), churchmen, led by the Rev. Willis Gerhart of Abilene, joined with Masonic bodies of Dallas and this area in erecting the cross at this site to mark his visit of 1878.

(1976).