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Submitted: 8/4/14 • Approved: 8/21/14 • Last Updated: 3/25/18 • R15234-G0-S3
PLANO MUTUAL CEMETERY
In the early 1800s, this land now known as Collin County, Texas won its independence from Mexico, becoming a sovereign nation. The broad borders of this new Republic of Texas encompassed several future U. S. states. Hoping to promote settlement, the Congress of the Republic of Texas offered parcels of free land, known locally as Peters Colony. Many of the families responding to heavy advertising came from Kentucky and Tennessee. This land was comprised of a fertile plain. Thus, this rich land was attractive to both the farmers and the stockman. Such a vast land was sparsely populated.
Plano Mutual Cemetery had its beginnings in the Forman Family Cemetery. The first person buried here in what is now an unmarked grave was a Dr. Lillie who died in 1852. Dr. Lillie, the nephew of William Forman, Sr., died within a few days of his arrival. Upon his death the owners of four sections of land that cornered together decided to locate a graveyard where each of the four could contribute an equal portion of land for the cemetery. For reasons unknown most of the earliest graves were all dug on Forman land. The second oldest grave is that of Eleanor C. Hawkins, age 16, said to have come from Kentucky to teach school. Lionel Simpson, Benjamin Matthews and his wife Mary Ann, who were Peters Colonists from Kentucky, are also buried in Plano Mutual Cemetery.
The additional portions of the cemetery resulted as a combination of several organizations, which purchased land for cemetery use by and for their members. Each organization handled its respective part as to who could be interred, how this right to interment was acquired, and provided maintenance.
As early as 1891 the ladies of the Plano community gathered together to keep the cemetery in good condition. A wooden pavilion is remembered to have straddled the center road and was large enough to let cars pass beneath. Metal benches were on either side with a pump nearby. The ladies received contributions, sold burial spaces and prepared meals for sale to the men who came each month to trade horses and mules in downtown Plano.
FORMAN FAMILY
In 1850 William Forman, his wife Ruth Chenoweth Forman and their five children moved from Kentucky to Texas. William Sr. had carefully planned this venture over some period of time. As a young man in Kentucky he was in charge of his father’s distillery and mills, giving his family skills with which to contribute to a new and raw community. William Sr. sold his considerable land holdings in Kentucky, collecting cash for Texas land purchases. Purchasing land from settlers who held original head rights, by 1853 William Forman and sons owned one single parcel of land consisting of nearly 1400 acres.
The family soon built a seven room clapboard house on their new land, near the original location of the town of Plano. The finished lumber had to be hauled from Jefferson by ox cart. William and his sons built both a grist mill and a saw mill that efficiently ran by steam and they added a distillery.
As the community continued to grow, William Forman, Sr. applied to the government for his house to become an official post office with himself as the postmaster. The name Plano was chosen for the town’s name. William Sr. died in 1856 and is buried on the part of his original land within the Plano Mutual Cemetery.
Contributed on 8/4/14 by gasirek
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Record #: 15234