Macum Phelan Announces Retirement December 1939. Macum Phelan was one of the most prominent Texas Methodist historians of the first half of the twentieth century. His two volumes on the history of Methodism in Texas was the second attempt at such a project, the first being that of Homer Thrall in the 19th century. Local church historians still consult both of Phelan’s volumes even through Phelan was able to consult far fewer resources than contemporary historians. Macum Phelan wrote his two volumes while serving as a pastor so he eas not able to devote his full attention to historical writing. Phelan had been born in Tennessee but was orphaned and moved to Waco to live with two older brothers. He worked as a cowhand and earned enough to attend the University of Texas to obtin a teacher’s certificate. He taught several years but received the call to preach and entered the old Northwest Texas Conference before its 1910 division into the Central and Nortwest Texas Conference. He served a number of churches including Roscoe, Baird, and Chilicothe, Childress, and Big Spring before transferring to California. He transferred back to Texas and served Hamilton, Haslet, and Crawford and served the Vernon District. He retired at age 65 in 1939 and wrote a letter to A. J. Weeks, editor of the Southwestern Christian Advocate to tell his friends to stop at his retirement home in Birdville to visit him. In that same letter he mentioned that he intended to keep writing and had already written his autobriography which included the “tragedy of California.” The autobiography was not published, and I have not seen the manuscript so I don’t know what happened in Calfironia. Hus later efforts at writing were hindered by his blindness, and he dided of a brian tumor in Fort Worth in 1950. -