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A. F. & A. M. FORREST LODGE NO. 19
One of 25 lodges started during the Republic of Texas, Forrest Lodge No. 19, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, was chartered on Jan. 11, 1844. It is the eighth oldest lodge in Texas.
Among its early members were Sam Houston and Texas historian Henderson Yoakum. Another outstanding member, William Martin Taylor( 1817-1871), is known as“ The Father of the Texas Work”. He published a handbook called“ Taylor’ s Monitor” which brought uniformity to Texas Masonic ritual.
The upper floor of a store owned by Alexander McDonald, the first worshipful master, served as an early meeting place. A two-story lodge hall on the north side of the square, built in 1850, was destroyed by fire in 1881 and was replaced by a brick building near the corner of University and 11th Street in 1883. The present property was acquired in 1896 and the new structure dedicated in 1909.— The lodge is located at 1030 10th Street.
HUNTSVILLE SPRINGS
Kentucky native Pleasant Gray and his wife Hannah( Holshouser) left Tennessee with their two children in 1834 and in 1835 settled here on land granted to them as part of Mexico’ s colonization effort. At that time natural springs located nearby served as a campsite for the area’ s Bedias Native American tribe and for immigrants passing through the region. After establishing a trading post near the springs with his brother Ephraim, Pleasant Gray subdivided his land into home and business lots and advertised the property in Alabama, Tennessee, New Orleans, and various steamboat offices. Settlers soon arrived and a town developed which Gray named after Huntsville, Alabama, a former family home. The area’ s bountiful springs were observed in the Texas chronicles written by British scientist / adventurer William Bollaert in 1843-44. Huntsville was incorporated in 1845. For many years townspeople were accustomed to using spring water captured in a trough near the springs. In 1893-1894 the city dug an artesian well within a few feet of the springs to provide water for municipal distribution and an ice factory. Shortly thereafter the watering trough at the spring fell into disuse, and the spring itself was boarded over.
— The marker is located in Founders Park, near the intersection of 10th Street and University Ave.
CAPTAIN JOE BYRD CEMETERY
Located a few blocks from the first prison in Texas, the Captain Joe Byrd Cemetery is the final resting place for more than 3,000 inmates who died while incarcerated within the Texas System. The first inmate to be interred here was laid to rest in the 1850s. During the first 100 years of the cemetery’ s use, inmates were buried among weeds and trees with no record of their death other than the grave marker.
Captain Joe Byrd Cemetery is the only active cemetery in Texas for inmates whose bodies are unclaimed by family. More than 100 people are buried here each year.— The cemetery is located at 380 Bowers Blvd.
Photo by James Hulse of Medina, Texas
26 | WELCOME TO HUNTSVILLE 2025