WARD PRAIRIE, TEXAS. Ward Prairie, also known as Lakes Chapel, is a widely scattered community on Farm Road 488 five miles northeast of Fairfield in central Freestone County. Both a Methodist church and a cemetery were established in 1876. The community had a school named Lakes Chapel School, which in 1893 had an enrollment of twenty-three students and in 1903 had an enrollment of twenty-four students. In the 1930s Ward Prairie had a school, a church, two cemeteries, a business, and a number of scattered dwellings. In the 1960s the community had a church, a few cemeteries, and a few dwellings, and in the late 1980s the church and cemeteries still remained.

BIBLIOGRAPHY: Freestone County Historical Commission, History of Freestone County, Texas (Fairfield, Texas, 1978).

Chris Cravens