Stories of an Old Country Preacher

The word "preacher" usually conjures up an image of an old man reading from the Bible to his congregation on Sunday morning. But for a preacher serving in the rural reaches of Texas in the 1960's, the job entailed so much more than just spreading the Good Word. The community churches weren't anything fancy, if they even existed at all. The congregations were small, sometimes no more than a couple of families. But these people depended on the country preachers, as their parents and grandparents did the circuit riders; to marry their children and grandchildren, to help them grieve for their fallen loved ones, and to offer advice for dealing with the hardships of rural life.