Old Graball

Maysfield is on Farm Road 485 eight miles northeast of Cameron in northeastern Milam County. It was originally called Old Graball, but its name was later changed to Maysfield in honor of Thomas Newton Mayes, who moved to the area in 1853. The Maysfield post office was established in 1868. A Presbyterian church was organized with two ruling elders and nine members at Maysfield in 1873. It met in the homes of members until a church building was constructed ten years later; the church had ninety members in 1884. Also in 1884 Maysfield had a steam gristmill and cotton gin, a good school, and 250 residents. The community was on the stage line between Calvert and Cameron. From the 1860s to the 1890s as many as four different railroad companies planned to lay track from either Calvert or Hearne through Maysfield to Cameron and eastward into Bell County. None of these projects was ever achieved, however, and Maysfield missed out on the economic prosperity that railroads brought to other commercial centers. A good part of the community's population was drawn away as a result, and by the mid-1890s only 150 residents were reported. In 1903 Maysfield had two one-teacher schools for seventy-four White students and two one-teacher schools for eighty-eight Black students. The community served as the focus of a common school district until the late 1960s or early 1970s, when it was consolidated with the Cameron Independent School District. Maysfield reported a population of 124 from the mid-1930s through the mid-1960s, when a slight upward trend began. The population was 130 in 1968 and 140 in 1990. The population remained the same in 2000.