A Brief History of Flower Mound
From the 1973 Greene Group Report by A.C. Greene
Long Prairie

The original name of the immediate area of the present Flower Mound Presbyterian Church was Long Prairie. Geographically it included a rather narrow, but lengthy (approximately four miles), stretch of east-west open country immediately south of Hallford Prairie. Apparently it was called Long Prairie before anyone had settled on it.

John L. Lovejoy, a participant in the Village Creek fight, (Editor's note: in which John B. Denton was killed) said in after years that the first sermon preached in Denton County was on Long Prairie, preached by John B. Denton to (Continued on p. 4) the company of rangers then chasing the Indians, on a Sunday morning in May, 1841. For several years the name continued to be used. One such occasion was a report in 1850 that "Sam Hazelton's widow married a doctor down on Long Prairie." (This is believed to have actually been Edy Wizwell, widow of John R. Wizwell, who married Dr. Burnett Doen.)

A report on an Indian raid in 1862 says, "Jack Foster, of Long Prairie, lost a boy." Even as late as 1879, in the deed given by Matthew Donald to Flower Mound Presbyterian Church, the location is described as "on Long Prairie." The church and the activity it generated seem to have caused "Long Prairie" to fall into disuse in favor of "Flower Mound in the latter half of the nineteenth century. Source of the Flower Mound Name Flower Mound is named for a small, smooth cretaceous mound on the southern line of the John R. Wizwell survey, which rises to a height of some 650 feet - about fifty feet above the surrounding prairie.

The name was given in the 1840's because of one particularly abundant growth year, wildflowers frequently being more abundant in one year than another. There is a legend that nothing may be built on the mound. One aspect of this legend involves Flower Mound Presbyterian Church. Materials were said to have been stacked on the mound in preparation for the erection of a church building when a tornado swept across the mound, flinging the materials before it. The elders of the church immediately changed site plans. (This does not correspond to known history of the Flower Mound church site.) A similar legend involves a house about to be erected on the mound which was also blown away. The builder quickly moved his homesite to the north side of the mound and there (according to the legend) it stands today. ( 1973)

The mound is a noticeable landmark and had enjoyed a kind of community status since settlement began. In some records, it is almost assumed to be public property. A kind of blue flowered grass once grew on the mound and was baled as a feed crop by the Beavers family. ( Possibly Bluestem? ) No trees have been known to grow on the mound in modern times.