Pickwick - McAdams Cemetery

A-L | M-Y

"Pickwick-McAdams Cemetery is located in the northwest part of Palo Pinto County, on Park Road 36.  This cemetery is known as McAdams Cemetery, but when the charter was applied for there was a McAdams Cemetery Association so the McAdams Cemetery Association voted to use the name Pickwick-McAdams Cemetery.  The deeds to the cemetery are recorded in the court house of Palo Pinto Co.

The cemetery was surveyed in 1969.  Mr. E. Constantin of Dallas, Texas, donated a plot of ground to enlarge the cemetery that year.  He asked that the property line of the part he donated be placed fifty feet from the property of the cabins on the south and west.  The fence is on the property line except across the front of the north side.

The original cemetery site was on the property of Captain William C. McAdams, a Texas Ranger and rancher, whose home and ranch headquarters were at McAdams Spring just north of the present cemetery.  Mrs. McAdams was the first one to be buried in the cemetery site.  Her grave is unmarked; therefore the exact date of her burial is unknown.

The first marked grave was Mrs. Mary M. Couger, who was born March 10, 1850 and died December 3, 1889.  The family had just moved to the Shut-In or Fortune Bend and she became ill and died 3 days later.

At one time Captain McAdams had an eight foot picket fence around the east end of the family burial site where he kept his horses and a few cattle to better protect them from the Indians.

In 1940, before Possum Kingdom Lake filled up, a number of graves from Carter Bend Cemetery were moved to the McAdams Cemetery.  The oldest grave moved from Carter Bend Cemetery was that of Frank Yelk, who was born November 1, 1814 and died September 14, 1879.  Some of the other graves moved were; Old man Crow; Mrs. Mary Elizabeth Bryan Wester, mother of Silas Wester; Mr. Scott, related to the Hodges who are buried in McAdams Cemetery; a negro who worked for Shapley Carter; a Mr. Mathis, husband of Mamie Blankenship; a Cannon baby; and a McKee baby.

In 1902 the Kyle baby, grand child of Captain McAdams, was buried in the family plot.  Joe Weldon was buried in 1904.  Then in 1906 Captain McAdams passed away after being bed ridden for three years with a broken hip.  He requested that his team carry his body to the cemetery.  Aunt Fanny McAdams, as she was known in the community, and Mrs. Kate Costello McMillan, walked behind the wagon to the cemetery.

The cemetery was fenced in 1915 with the ornamental fencing which was paid for by the people of the community.  In 1946 Ed Costello sent out cards asking interested people to donate for the upkeep of the cemetery.  Before this Matt McMillan and the Gilmore boys had kept the cemetery mowed.

In 1946 the Association was organized with Connie Costello, as president and a registry of those attending the regular meeting the first Sunday in May has been kept with an average yearly attendance of 121.  The Association voted to put out trees in 1953, when C. M. Weldon was president.  It was a droughty summer so the men laid water lines in the cemetery and the women volunteered and watered the trees through the drought.  Claude Stevenson furnished the water.

The Association compiled a register of 236 graves and 37 unmarked graves in 1968, when Estes Weldon was president.  A few women and men of the community did this project.

According to the markers there are nineteen men who served in the Armed Forces.  Four of these were killed in action.  The oldest person buried in the cemetery was Mrs. Rebecca E. May who was born January 16, 1872 and died February 28, 1971.  She was 99 years, one month, and eleven days old.

The Association is working toward perpetual care.  The present officers are Estes Weldon, President; Mary Eva Caudill, Vice-President; Mary Helen Mitchell, Secretary and Treasurer.  The directors are Leonard Cranfor, Curtis Mitchell, Walter Layton, Delbert Birdges, Litt Newman, Vernon Bridges, and Claude Stevenson.

The McAdams Cemetery is located at Possum Kingdom Lake.  Census was taken by Connie Costello in 1973 - The oldest grave is Frank Yelk - born 1814, died 1879.  There are 225 graves."