Photo Caption: A 1930 photo of the Ludewig Furniture building (now Johnson Furniture Co) which was built in 1929 on City Lot 89 at the corner of South Seguin Avenue and Coll Street.

By Keva Hoffmann Boardman —

Last week I took on the challenge of finding out about City Lot 89. It is located on the corner of South Seguin Avenue and Coll Street, across from the First Protestant Church. We know it today as the location of Johnson Furniture Co and their lovely, landscaped corner.

This prime real estate was first drawn by lot from the Adelsverein’s land grant by Aloys Rosser in 1848. Rosser sold it to Jacob Winkler in 1850, who quickly flipped it to H. Bevenroth. By 1854, Bevenroth’s estate had sold Lot 89 to Charles Rossy and his wife, and they sold it to Carl Floege. Six owners in six years — I’m guessing that maybe they wanted farmland not city property or perhaps saw a quick way to make some cash.

Carl Floege, a cabinetmaker by trade, immigrated to Texas in 1849. After obtaining Lot 89 in 1854, he built a home and his first general store on the property. He built a much larger, two-story business on Main Plaza (location of Utilities building) and a larger home off Market Plaza. Impressive! More impressive, he used his carpentry skills and know-how to build the first low-water bridge over the Comal at West San Antonio Street (1856), the Torrey Mill bridge on the Comal at Bridge Street (1867) and a new high-water bridge over the Comal (1873) at the location of his former low-water bridge after it had washed away.

Mr. Floege also used his trade to work on the first Comal County Courthouse (1856), a new 66-foot river ferryboat (1859), add rooms to the New Braunfels Academy (1867), deal with city streets and drainage issues (1873-1874), and build numerous stores and homes. Carl could truthfully say he built a lot of old New Braunfels with his two hands.

Carl Floege sold Lot 89 to Rudolph DuMenil in 1858, after the completion of his larger store and home. DuMenil had emigrated from Germany in 1850, and first lived in Hortontown where he ran a meat market for about eight years. In 1858, he moved into the old Floege home and set up his own general merchandising business in the old Floege Store. DuMenil literally sold everything but the kitchen sink — Hungarian grass, bois d’arc saplings for living fence lines, whiskey and brandy, clothing, dry goods, lead and percussion caps, hardware, tobacco products, paint, stoves and kitchenware. Maybe he did sell the sink! Rudolph also sold an ambulance, pianos and did freighting as well as being involved in local education as a trustee at the New Braunfels Academy.

In 1875, DuMenil auctioned off his store inventory and rented the store building to Carl Floege’s son Herman to use as a wagon business. When Herman Floege moved his business elsewhere in 1881, the store was rented to Homans Saddlery/Leather shop.

Lot 89, with the old Floege home and store, was sold by the DuMenils to Cuno “C.J.” Ludewig in 1902. Mr. Ludewig and his brothers had started a furniture business in 1887 at the location of the old Krueger Chevrolet building (across from Granzin Bar-B-Q). C. J. Ludewig took over the business from his brothers and moved it to the Seguin Street property in 1905. The family lived in the old home and ran the furniture company out of the DuMenil store. In 1929, a new “modern” brick building was built next to the old DuMenil store. It had the first elevator in any building in New Braunfels. Almost 3,500 townspeople attended the new store opening event where souvenir ashtrays featuring Charles Lindbergh’s face were distributed. The building was just one of several “modern” buildings built just prior to the market crash of 1929: Travelers Hotel (Faust) 1927, Comal Power Plant (Landmark) 1926, Greyhound Bus Station (Celebrations) 1929, Booker T. Washington School 1929, and the old City Hall 1929, to name a few.

All three of Ludewig’s sons helped in the store. Local competitors included Jahn Furniture Co., Lack’s Furniture & Automotive, and Starke’s Furniture in Seguin. Ludewig’s sold all kinds of high-quality manufactured furniture that included kitchen, living and bedroom pieces. To promote their company, C.J.’s son, Monroe F. “Fatty” Ludewig, began giving out “little Lane cedar chests” to graduating senior girls in New Braunfels. I still have mine!

Photo Caption: The 1858 Floege/DuMenil building sat next to Ludewig’s building until 1984, when it was moved to Gruene.

When the Ludewig fam­ily de­cided to get out of the busi­ness, they leased the 1929 fur­ni­ture build­ing and the old Du­Me­nil store to Wal­lace and Dorothy John­son in 1966, who con­tin­ued to run the busi­ness un­der the name John­son Fur­ni­ture Co. In 1972, the John­sons bought the prop­erty out­right. In 1984, the old Du­Me­nil Store was sold and moved to Gruene (Hunter Junc­tion) where it sur­vives.

Wal­lace and Dorothy’s daugh­ter Carol pur­chased the prop­erty from her par­ents in 1989 and runs the John­son Fur­ni­ture store to­day. She con­tin­ues the legacy of pro­vid­ing qual­ity fur­ni­ture and decor to New Braun­fels cit­i­zens that be­gan on Lot 89 over 120 years ago.

If you have never been in­side this his­toric fam­ily busi­ness, you have a chance to prac­tice yoga in it on Thurs­day, Oc­to­ber 10, 2024, from 5:30–7 p.m. The $15 fee ben­e­fits the So­phien­burg Mu­seum & Archives. Fol­low­ing prac­tice, a bev­er­age and his­tory talk will let you ex­plore the build­ing.

If you are not into yoga, drop by the store, say hello and check out all the good stuff. Carol’s got a chair, bed or table that is bound to have your name on it.

Sources: Sophienburg Museum & Archives: Ludewig, Floege and DuMenil family histories; Reflections program #918-Monroe C. Ludewig; New Braunfels Herald and Neu Braunfelser Herald newspaper collections.

“Around the Sophienburg” is published every other weekend in the New Braunfels Herald-Zeitung.