[2] The Bear Creek Baptist congregation was the earliest organized Christian group in Adair County, dating to the late 1830s.

[4] Reverend Talbot Hight is recognized as the chief organizer of the congregation, in the period of late 1838 - early 1839.

Following Connor's 1856 death he was interred on a portion of his land informally deeded to the Bear Creek congregation for purposes of a church and cemetery.

[5] In May, 1982 a non-profit corporation, the aforementioned Bear Creek Cemetery Association of Adair County, was established to care for the property and building.

On May 13 of that year a tornado estimated as an EF2 on the Enhanced Fujita Scale passed near the church as it left a path of death and destruction from Novinger to Kirksville.