Started in 1974 as a mail-order business in Houston, TX by Edith Myers, who wanted to spread her love of good Catholic literature. After the death of her husband in 1978, she and one of her sons, Richard, moved to Waco, TX and opened up the first store front for Stella Maris Books & Gifts.

Due to the amount of customers driving down from DFW, Edith & Richard moved to Fort Worth, TX in 1981 and reopened the store on McCart Ave (off of Berry St.), where they slowly expanded and tripled in size. They then added on St. Anthony’s Church Supplies. The store was in the McCart location for 31 years.

Richard married Mary Martin in 1990. They have four children, Jenny, Suzy, Sam, & Jacob. Jacob was born a year after the passing of Edith, in 2001. Richard & Mary took over the store as co-owners.

In the early 2000’s, they canceled shipping out the mail-order catalog, and created our website, but to this day still send out Church Supply catalogs to hundreds of churches all over the United States. Late 2011 owners of the building switched and on June 13, 2012, also the feast day of St. Anthony of Padua, the store was moved to it’s current location – 5312 Trail Lake Dr. in the Wedgewood Village Shopping Center.

Richard passed away in late 2016, leaving Mary as the current owner. Last year, 2019, Stella Maris Books celebrated 45 years of business.