By Tara V. Kohlenberg —

When I was 6 years old, I remember proudly being able to finally count to 100 without messing up. I counted 100 pennies. I counted 100 M&M’s (though I rarely made it through that without eating some). Those were tangible. It is still very hard for me to wrap my head around counting 100 of anything intangible … like 100 years. What was it even like 100 years ago in 1926?

Well, World War I ended in 1918. The U.S. economy was humming along, and automobiles became common place. Queen Elizabeth II was born, and the magician Houdini died. The famed U.S. Route 66 was established, connecting Chicago, Illinois to Santa Monica, California. Closer to home, the towering Comal Power Plant (LCRA, now The Landmark Apartments) was built, and, believe it or not, the Women’s Civic Improvement Club funded the installation of a women’s restroom under the bandstand on Main Plaza.

As New Braunfels grew, the number of churches grew to serve the needs of people moving into the community. In August of 1925, an announcement appeared in the New Braunfels Herald touting Rev. H. Schliesser, a field missionary of the Lutheran Texas Synod, was in New Braunfels to organize a Lutheran congregation. The first services, conducted in German, were upstairs at Mergele Hall.

The Mergeles of Harry Mergele’s Hall are founding families from France. They were merchants. Their home is the little green building that sits behind the store at 166 Comal Avenue (now the chiropractor office). Mergele Hall may not ring a bell with you because the building has had so many other occupants. The two-story building, now the home of Water 2 Wine at 185 S. Seguin, has housed many entities over the years, including a place for the militia to drill, a dance studio, piano studio, and an assembly hall, part of Denson-Dedeke Gifts (downstairs) in the ‘80s and the original retail space for Celebrations Bridal (upstairs). St. Paul Lutheran was one of many churches that got their start upstairs at Mergele Hall.

The new Evangelical Lutheran St. Paul Congregation was established and officially recognized March 21, 1926. The church continued to grow under the guidance of the Rev. H Schliesser. The services were conducted in German in the morning and English in the afternoon with Sunday School in between.

By October 1926, the Lutheran Mission Board of the Iowa Synod voted to contribute to the St. Paul congregation, helping them purchase a house and lot on San Antonio Street for a parsonage, along with two adjacent lots to build a church on Santa Clara. They operated out of those few buildings for a while as they continued to grow their services.

Within a year, they added a St Paul Lutheran Ladies Aid and St. Paul Luther League (for teens), and the St. Paul Lutheran Brotherhood. 1928 saw more opportunities to participate in worship with the creation of the sanctuary and junior choirs. Then, the Great Depression hit.

In 1939, Rev. H.A. Heineke formed a building committee to begin planning a new church building. The church, designed by noted architect, Jeremiah Schmidt, and built by C. R. Roessler, was built of native fieldstone with beautiful dark wood interior beams/trim and stained-glass windows. The $6,000 ($110,000 today) note covered the building and furniture. The church, now known as the Chapel, was dedicated on April 14, 1940. The Chapel is one of the only Jeremiah Schmidt buildings in New Braunfels without a Texas State Historical marker.

St. Paul’s congregation continued to grow, much like churches across the U.S. in the 1960s. This growth prompted the congregation to expand their footprint. In 1962, a new, larger sanctuary was built. The new church building wrapped around the original Jeremiah Schmidt chapel, with its modern design incorporating similar stone, wood beams and colorful stained-glass windows.

With New Braunfels being 180 years old, you might wonder why it took 80 years for a Lutheran church congregation to be established. Well, there is a whole backstory to that. The Lutheran denominations began in Europe and arrived in Texas with German, Swedish, Czech immigrants. In 1850, Pastor Kleiss of Baden, Germany, arrived in Texas to check out the possibilities for new Lutheran congregations. He established himself in the Hortontown and Neighborsville communities across the river from New Braunfels.

In 1851, the German-speaking congregation erected St. Martin Church, the oldest Lutheran church in Texas. A school building was built in 1870 (still standing across from New Braunfels Conservation Society gate). The congregation grew until the turn of the century. St. Martin’s was part of the Evangelical Lutheran Synod of Texas. It became difficult to supply churches with German-speaking pastors who were of Evangelical or Reformed faith. When services were discontinued, the congregants attended nearby German-speaking churches, First Protestant Church in New Braunfels or Friedens Church in Geronimo.

St. Martin’s Church was taken over and restored by the St. Paul Lutheran Congregation in 1963. St. Martin’s Church was moved to its present place in the Hortontown Cemetery when Loop 337 was built and is marked by a Texas Historical Marker. St. Paul Lutheran Church still holds special services in St. Martins.

One hundred years ago, St. Paul Lutheran began a journey in Christ and extended itself to not only take care of future congregants, but to honor the history of Lutheranism in Texas. Here’s to counting 100 more years!

Sources: Sophienburg Museum and Archives

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

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By Tara V. Kohlenberg —

Part I of the history of 650 and 666 South Seguin Avenue properties was a story of immigrants who worked hard and expanded their family holdings. Now, on to Part II.

Ysmael Zamora Isasi and Otila Martinez, fled the atrocities of the Mexican Revolution with their children to become permanent residents of the United States. Shortly after they crossed the Texas border, their daughter, Olivia Zamora, was born in Laredo, Texas in May of 1913. The Zamoras learned that a Mr. Dittlinger was hiring men for his lime quarry just outside of New Braunfels. The work was hard but the jobs came with free housing. While Ysmael worked in the quarry, Otila helped earn money by cooking for the workers. She also found a cheap source for boots and clothes to sell to the workers. Eventually the Zamoras put enough money aside to build their own grocery store in New Braunfels. Their daughter, Olivia, grew up helping her parents at Zamora Grocery, located at 197 North Hackberry Street where their living quarters were attached to the store.

About 1930, at age seventeen, Olivia met and married Felix Garza Sanchez. The twenty-year-old Felix was born in Rio Verde (Lampazos, Nuevo Leon, Mexico) to Felix Garza Flores and Maria de la Paz Sánchez Mendiola. Felix was a man of slim build, fair skin with an incredible work ethic and great ambition. The newlyweds lived in a little house on Market Street close to downtown New Braunfels. Felix worked for Comal Dairy. Olivia stayed home to care for their children, Ysmael (Mike), Carlos and Maria de la Paz (Mary). They later rented a house at 635 South Seguin Avenue.

Olivia’s brothers, Raul and Manuel, had learned from their parents’ grocery business and began their own produce truck business. Young Felix went into business for himself when he was given his first produce truck by Olivia’s uncle Antonio. He would purchase produce wholesale in San Antonio and sell it door to door to wealthy and middle-class customers in New Braunfels.

One day Olivia asked Felix to leave a bushel of fruit and a bushel of vegetables outside their home so she could sell it to passersby. She saved $500 in the middle of the Great Depression selling produce from her front yard. Millions of people were out of work during the Depression, but she was saving money. That’s dedication! They began Valley Fruit Stand at 635 South Seguin in 1933. Business grew and in 1939 they expanded, moving the store across the street to 666 South Seguin Avenue. They paid an out of work carpenter, Mr. Vicente Villareal, to expand the store in 1940.

The store name was later changed to Valley Fruit Store. The store was tiny but full service with a dairy case, many shelf items and a meat market. There were previously no Hispanic-owned businesses on that street. It is believed that the store underwent more than one expansion at that site. As a point of interest, the ‘666’ street number was eventually changed to 664 after more than 60 years because later renters of the building were superstitious about the number 666.

The house behind the store was built in 1940, and sometime later two bedrooms were added. They bought the land from Otto and Emma Bodeman for $400. The house had a front yard, a large back yard, and a long gravel driveway to one side that reached Castell Street behind the property. Daughter Alicia was born in 1943. Felix Junior was born in 1947 and died in 1948. Otila, the youngest, was born in 1949. They later bought the big house next door at 650 South Seguin Street on October 16, 1950, from Oliver Sands for $8,000. The monthly mortgage was $63.29. The house was remodeled, as it had been boarded up by Mr. Sands for two years after the death of his wife.

Felix was an active member of the New Braunfels LULAC- League of United Latin American Citizens. In 1943, he registered his children, Ismael, Carlos and Mary at Carl Schurz Elementary School. Only two other Hispanic families registered their kids at Carl Schurz that year. It was the first year that Hispanic kids were integrated into the public schools in New Braunfels. On the first day of school, Felix walked his children into school. There were protests, so Henry B. Gonzalez, from San Antonio, the National Guard and the New Braunfels police were present. Prior to 1943, they had to walk across town to the segregated Stephen F. Austin School in Comaltown. The African American kids attended the Booker T. Washington School, which was actually the closest school to the Garza home. The African American kids did not integrate until the 1950s.

Felix’s activism took him to neighboring towns. On September 30, 1951, he and Alberto Aragon traveled to an event in Seguin to talk about integrating the Hispanic children into the neighborhood schools. They attended the event at Starke Park with Paul Fritz, the principal of Juan Seguin Elementary School. When they left the park, Paul Fritz’s car was struck by another car killing both Mr. Fritz and Felix Garza. Alberto Aragon, the godfather of Garza’s children, suffered a broken leg. JT Morgan, 19, of LaVernia was also injured. His brother, Samuel, who was driving the oncoming car, was not injured. Felix was forty-one years old.

After Felix died, Olivia ran the store for the next ten years with son Ismael. Medical issues forced her to make big decisions. Olivia closed the store after 28 years. She was only forty-five years old. She rented out the store building and went after a new career. She earned her beauticians license and opened Be Lovely Beauty Salon in what was the master bedroom of her home at 650 South Seguin. That is how I remember that building. She worked in her beauty shop into her late sixties. During that time, Olivia also derived income by renting out her real estate. The store at 666 was occupied over the years Red Elbel Used Furniture & Appliances, Howard TV & Appliance and Hill Country Trail Antiques.

The Garza family taught by example: how to survive in hard times, how to do what is right and how to raise a strong and intelligent family. Like the earlier German immigrants, they, too, were good stewards of the properties at 650 and 666 South Seguin Avenue and an asset to New Braunfels.

Sources: Sophienburg Museum & Archives; Alicia Garza Moreno.

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By Tara V. Kohlenberg —

Having lived in New Braunfels for most of my life, it feels oddly disturbing to see long-standing buildings damaged or torn down. It also piques my interest. Questions about what happened there or where the buildings went start spinning in my head. I wanted to know what happened to the collection of gray and orange buildings on South Seguin Avenue, recently vacated by Adele Kerr Antiques. As a child, I remember the buildings so differently. Definitely not gray with orange trim. So, let’s dig in.

First of all, the property of gray buildings really had multiple addresses. We will start with the oldest building. The building that looked like a house with a closed-in porch and an orange door was, indeed, a house. It was built in 1909. The property was once part of the estate of Conrad Friedrick Meyer, one of the city’s earliest citizens.

Conrad Meyer, 29, emigrated from Grossenmahner, Hildesheim, Hanover, with his wife Christine Kassel Meyer, 28, and son Christian, age 5, arrived on the ship Eberhardt in 1845. According to census records, Conrad Meyer was listed as a stonemason and later, a farmer. He and his wife had ten children, two of which died in childhood.

Conrad was an active community member. During the Civil War, at age 45, he was enlisted as a private with the Comal County Militia, Company A. He was listed in the 1878 Reunion of Surviving Settlers photograph taken in front of the original Adelsverein Sophienburg building. Conrad Meyer and wife made their home on acreage located between South Seguin and Castell Avenues. That property eventually became part of New City Block 1034.

Their fourth child, Marie (Mary) married Robert C. Sands, a Union solider from Indiana whom she met while his unit was stationed on Camp Street in Comaltown. They, in turn, had three daughters, Fenora Sands, Laura Sands, Clara Sands and one son, Oliver. From her father, Mary Sands was deeded Lot #25 on which to build their home. Having lost her husband at age 44, Mary continued to share the home with her three daughters — who never married. They lived all in the home until the last daughter died in 1950. Lot #25 is located at 636 S. Seguin where Cancun Mexican Restaurant recently burned down.

Mary also later received Lots #23, 24, 9 and 10 from her father’s estate. Just for perspective, lots 23, 24 and 25 face S. Seguin. Lots 9 and 10 back up to 23 and 24, but face Castell. Lot #23, located at 666 S. Seguin Avenue, was acquired at some point by local businessman Otto Bodeman and his wife Emma. Nothing was built on the property. They sold it in 1939 to Felix Garza.

Mary Sands deeded Lot #24 to her son Oliver, who built the beautiful house at 650 South Seguin in 1909. Oliver and his wife had two children. Their home was masterfully constructed with state-of-the-art materials on a pier and beam foundation. The front of the house was symmetrical, with large windows flanking the big wooden door. The door was framed by sidelight and transom windows. The porch ran the width of house, accentuating the simple architectural design. Originally, it had three fireplaces which were later covered by drywall when the gas floor furnace was installed in the living room. Oliver and Julie Sands continued to live out their lives in the home after their family was grown. Julie Sands died in March of 1948. The house was sold in 1950 to Felix Garza.

The story of Felix and Olivia Zamora Garza and the properties of South Seguin Avenue is a whole other story all its own. I will save that for next time. In the meantime, I will tell you that the once beautiful Sands house has been saved; moved to another location nearby to enjoy a rebirth with another owner in recent weeks. Stay tuned for the Garza story.

Sources: Sophienburg Museum & Archives; Alicia Garza Moreno; Sally Tamayo Stoneking.

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By Tara V. Kohlenberg —

Some fifty years ago, New Braunfels was still a small town. You know, very Mayberry, where they pulled up the fire hydrants, rolled up the sidewalks and locked them in the bank every day at 6 p.m. At least they did from my child-eye view. One of the few things that I remember about drives through town on a summer Saturday evening, was stopping in front of Seidel’s Studio and Camera Shop to look at all of the beautiful portraits — brides, babies, families. The images captured the essence of the subjects in that one moment in time. Without knowing it, the Seidels became some of the greatest historians of New Braunfels. The Seidel story begins post WWI.

Otto Seidel and Johanna Schmidt met and married in Germany in 1921. Johanna’s mother and stepfather, Mary and Frank Bluemel, had emigrated to Texas in 1913 before the war. Mary wrote letter after letter to the Seidels, telling them wonderful things about New Braunfels and inviting them to come. The young couple took a chance and moved to New Braunfels early in 1922. Otto had a little photography experience from WWI, so it seemed only natural that he would want to buy a photography studio, which he did. The Seidels bought Bluemel’s Studio from Frank Bluemel.

Unlike today, a professional photographer was required to take pictures of things, everything from weddings to new buildings to accidents. Professional cameras in that day and age were big and bulky and absolutely nothing was automated. The photographer stood under a big black cover to look through the viewfinder at an upside-down image while holding a trough of black powder on a stick. A cotton string was lit and the photographer manually opened the shutter when the flame ignited the powder in the trough, creating a flash. In the best of conditions, say, standing in a room with said camera taking a picture of a single person, it could be very tough to get consistently good photos. Otto Seidel had a knack for it. Can you imagine having to travel with that giant thing? Travel they did. In the mid-20s, the Seidels were asked to take construction photographs of the McQueeny and Clear Springs Dams, with their huge, bulky camera complete with black powder flash, down inside the dam structures. They also were asked to take photos during construction of the Comal Power Supply /LCRA building. There were no aerial photos, no drones back then, so when asked to photograph all the tin roofs in New Braunfels, Otto climbed the tallest structure he knew of. He set up his huge camera and tripod on top of the Coll Street water tower. Yikes! In later years, the cameras were smaller, but the electric flash required an eighteen-pound battery pack slung over one’s shoulder to make it work.

Originally, the studio was located on Castell Avenue between the back of what is now The Phoenix Saloon and the Hinman House/Communities in Schools. By the early 30’s, Seidel’s Studio moved to the Hinman Building on W. San Antonio above Peerless Pharmacy (where Dancing Pony is now).

In 1939, the business relocated to a very modern art deco building at 453 W. San Antonio Street (now Keller Williams Realtors). The family home was right next door. The Seidels had two boys, Edmound and Rudy (born 1922 & 1924) who were involved in the business even as children. In his spare time, Otto would shoot pictures of Landa’s Park and surrounding New Braunfels. Seidel’s Studio printed hundreds of scenic post cards to sell in the drug stores for ¼ cent each. The children helped lay the cards out all over the floor of the studio to have room to dry.

In 1941, the Seidels became a direct dealer for Eastman Kodak Company. They processed customer’s film promising same day service. With the help of their son Rudy, they gradually broadened their services to include cameras and camera equipment sales, becoming Seidel Studio and Camera Shop. More services meant the need for more space. They enlarged the building in 1951. Rudy took over the business in 1955. They doubled their footprint again with an expansion in 1957. The building was remodeled in 1970, as were many other buildings at that time, to give it a Bavarian fachwerk look. The Seidel building finally was sold by the Seidel family in 2006. The building has been remodeled again in recent years to the ultra-modern stucco and glass version we see today.

The Seidels were very devoted to their work. Otto, Johanna, and Rudy worked all day and well into the evening six days a week, shooting studio portraits or business/industrial locations during the week followed by weddings on Saturdays. In the meantime, they had to process the film and print photos. Before color film, everything was shot in black and white. Color photographs were produced by “hand tinting” the black and white images with shear paints. On bridal pictures, the color of each gown was documented so that it could be tinted the proper shade. It was very time consuming. The Seidels were also called upon to shoot photos of accidents for the police or sheriff departments, many times in the middle of the night. Rudy and Otto saw some pretty gruesome sights. The year before the Studio sold, the Seidels calculated that they worked every day but 4 Sundays.

In 1970, the photography studio was sold to Vera Shaw, an eighteen-year employee, also from Germany. The studio operated as Braunfels Studio until 1989. Rudy continued with the camera shop. They sold state of the art cameras and equipment. The Herald-Zeitung bought many a camera there. After Otto Seidel died in 1976, the camera business was sold to Pat and Connie Miller in 1978. Shortly afterward, Herb Skoog learned that 48 years of negatives held in storage were about to be thrown out. Skoog encouraged the Millers to donate all of the Seidel Studio’s negatives to the Sophienburg Museum and Archives. The Seidel Collection at the Sophienburg contains approximately 25,000 photos and negatives.

The Seidel family of photographers chronicled the history of New Braunfels from 1922 to 1970. After that, their legacy was continued by those under their tutelage. Generations of New Braunfels residents have been captured on film by the Seidels. Were you one of the photos in the portrait window.

Sources: Sophienburg Museum & Archives; Reflections; Seidel Collection.

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Whether winging their way through barrages of shells, dodging shrapnel, maneuvering through clouds of gas, or flying through torrential downpours of machine gun and anti-aircraft gun bullets, pigeons were feathered aviators that played an essential role in the Great War.

Both the Greek and the Roman armies used homing pigeons in warfare. Hannibal carried baskets of pigeons with him as he crossed the Alps to send messages back to Carthage. Although the US tried to integrate pigeons into the Signal Corps during the US war with Mexico, it wasn’t until WWI that Washington scoured the country for good homing birds to send to France. The A.E.F. organized pigeon companies following the lead of successful French, British, Russian and Italian army enterprises.

Pigeons did their bit when German barrages knocked out all lines of communication between the front and general headquarters. They carried messages at the first Battle of the Marne, aided the British in the capture of Neuve Chapelle, and died alongside British “Tommies” when the Germans used poison (chlorine) gas for the first time at the second Battle of Ypres.

Pigeons were used by all branches of the service, but most were quartered with the infantry. There would be a man in each company assigned to carry several pigeons in a basket upon his back. After Ypres, the baskets and cotes were fitted with covers to protect the birds from gas attacks. The birds remained on duty in the trenches for 4-5 days before they received R & R back at headquarters.

The birds were kept in wheeled cotes about 8 to 10 miles from the front lines; each cote contained about 75 birds. Moving with the armies, the birds would learn to know their new “home” in 7-10 days. Carefully coached by their keepers, they were first released 100 feet away to fly back, then 1000 feet, and later 3-4 miles away to learn the way “home”. They were taught to enter the cote immediately upon arrival and to ring a bell so messages would be received in a timely manner.

Pigeon messages were coded and written on fine tissue paper folded inside a leather wad. The wad was inserted into an aluminum holder seared to the bird’s leg. When released, the pigeon would fly straight up, pause to get his bearings, then fly in the direction of “home”. The Germans assigned snipers to shoot down the birds when they paused at the top, so pigeons were taught to keep spiraling.

There were many famous birds during the war. “Cher Ami“ saved the “Lost Battalion” in the Argonne with a shot leg and a bullet in her breast bone. “Le Cirq” helped capture a German U-boat. “Babette” carried a message that stopped a surprise German attack on the Meuse. “President Wilson” was shot in the leg carrying the message that saved his outfit; he was “too good a soldier to be invalided home”. After his leg healed, he was assigned to a division of tanks where he carried messages from the tanks back to the artillery line giving exact locations of hidden machine-gun nests. The service of these and many other birds literally saved the lives of thousands of soldiers.

Naval patrol boats and airplanes also carried pigeons. Birds flew back to the beaches with the locations of downed planes and torpedoed boats thus saving the crews. And they flew fast … “Red Cloud”, assigned to the US Navy, once flew 535 miles in 10 hours and 20 minutes breaking the world record!

The Sophienburg Museum & Archives holds the microfilm collection of the Neu Braunfelser Zeitung, the New Braunfels Herald, the New Braunfels Chronicle, and the New Braunfels Herald-Zeitung. I looked up pigeons in the partial index and found out that in the 1870s, men were already keeping birds in cotes and trading/buying them. When Dr. H. Grube purchased 4 pair of carrier pigeons from St. Louis in November of 1895, it made the newspaper. He made news again when he took his trained birds to Anhalt, 25 miles from town, and released them. They arrived back home in 20 minutes…way before he made it back to town on horseback.

In 1903, in an article claiming “first wireless telegram to New Braunfels”, Richard Scholl received a telegram from San Antonio. The telegram did not come via the Marconi system but by carrier pigeon. His uncle had taken a bird to San Antonio, attached the telegram, and let it go at 9 am; by 1 pm, it was “home” safe and sound.

Who in your family raised and raced pigeons? Share your stories and photos with the Sophienburg by contacting us at archives@sophienburg.com or calling 830.629.1572.

Sources:

• NB Newspaper Collection, The American Legion Weekly, Aug.29, 1919
• http://www.texascooppower.com/texas-stories/nature-outdoors/off-to-the-races

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Happy Easter today while you celebrate the Resurrection and the coming of Spring. It’s a particularly exciting time for members of St. Paul Lutheran Church of New Braunfels. They have chosen to build a new church on their historic property. While traveling down San Antonio Street towards the plaza, I noticed a building program going on at St. Paul Lutheran Church. There was a wonderful old stone building, still part of the campus and they were building around it, still preserving it.

Lutherans In Texas

Lutherans have been in Texas for a long time. On November 8, 1851, the first Evangelical Lutheran Synod of Texas was organized by the St. Chrischone Missionaries. They were interested in establishing mission churches in the Guadalupe Valley of Texas. At the second convention of the Synod in May, 1852, Pastor Braschler and Pastor Kleiss were present. Pastor Kleiss had been in the Neighborsville-Hortontown area as pastor for a newly formed group of Lutherans for two years and now Pastor Braschler was going to become the minister. Pastor Braschler served as both teacher and pastor of the Lutheran group. On August 13, 1854, a formal congregation organized under the name of the Evangelical Lutheran Saint Martin Congregation. It embraced both Neighborsville and Hortontown. The St. Martin Evangelical Lutheran Church is known as the oldest Lutheran Church in Texas.

Incidentally, Pastor Braschler’s home is still standing and located at 249 Kowald Lane. It has a Texas Historical Marker and is a Recorded Texas Historic Landmark. The land was sold to Pastor Braschler by Jacob de Cordova. De Cordova, along with church parishioners helped Braschler build the home.

Rev. Milton Frueh compiled the history of St. Martin Church and he writes that the 1850 beginning of St. Martin is associated with founder, Pastor Theobald G. Kleiss from Germany. In 1851, the Neighborsville-Hortontown congregation erected a church building and the services were conducted in German. In 1852, Pastor Braschler became the minister followed by Rev. Albert Kypfer, who served from 1857 to 1880. Kypfer was the last full-time pastor. In 1870 a school was built next to the church. It was the Church Hill School that is still standing on Church Hill Drive across from Conservation Plaza. It is owned and maintained by the New Braunfels Conservation Society. It also has a Texas Historical Marker and is a Recorded Texas Historic Landmark. Near 1900, the Evangelical Lutheran Synod of Texas congregations ceased to provide a resident pastor for the church. Many members left and joined other German-speaking congregations like Friedens and First Protestant Church.

For safekeeping, the church records were given to First Protestant Church and in 1968, the St. Martin Church building was moved from Church Hill Drive, a short distance away to sit in a prominent location on Loop 337 within the Hortontown Cemetery. St. Paul Lutheran Church owns and maintains the beautifully restored church. It is currently used for historical tours, weddings, church services and family gatherings.

St. Paul Lutheran

Twenty years passed with no Lutheran church, and in 1920 the Mission Board of the Texas District of the former Iowa Synod had been considering establishing a mission church in New Braunfels. In 1925, Rev. Henry H. Schliesser began conducting services twice a month in a building on Seguin Avenue (Mergele building). The organization of a congregation seemed favorable, so in 1926, the Evangelical Lutheran St. Paul Congregation was organized. A small chapel was built in 1927.

In 1939, under Pastor Heineke, the building of a new church (currently the chapel that is still standing) was started and dedicated in 1940. A new sanctuary was dedicated in 1962, a full-time day school was organized in 1983 and an education complex dedicated.

Martin Luther

Martin Luther was behind the whole Lutheran movement. Who was Martin Luther and what influence did he have on the world? Martin Luther was born in 1483 and was a German professor of theology, a composer, a priest and monk, and was a key figure in the Protestant Reformation. He disputed the Catholic Church view that freedom from God’s punishment for sin could be purchased by paying money. He believed and taught that salvation and eternal life were not earned by deeds but a gift from God through believers in Jesus Christ. Those who identified with his beliefs and teachings were called Lutherans. The Reformation was aimed at the Late Medieval corruption of the Catholic Church that resulted in the Protestant movement. The word Reformation means to reform.

Luther also translated the Bible into German, using a dialect that would reach most of the German people. Each state in Germany, at the time, had developed a different dialect of the language and in many cases, they could not even understand each other. By Luther translating the Bible, the German language became standardized. The language used in the translation became a part of the German heritage and the creation of a German identity. His goal was to make the Bible accessible to everyday Germans that could be used in church, at school and at home. He translated the New Testament from Greek in 1522 and the Old Testament from Hebrew in 1534. Although not the first translations to German, they were the most popular. This translation was one of the most important aspects of the Reformation.

Luther’s hymns influenced singing in Protestant Churches. Of course, his most famous hymn is “A Mighty Fortress is Our God” sung to this day in many Protestant Churches. Luther’s Bible stirred a mighty storm in the church giving power to the clerically dominated public.

The printing press

A German, Johannes Gutenberg, invented the printing press around 1440. The invention and spread of the printing press was one of the most influential aspects of the time. It ushered in the modern age. By 1500, the printing press was in operation throughout most of Western Europe. The result was the permanent alteration of society. The circulation of ideas through the printed word, captured the masses in the Reformation and threatened current government and religious authorities. No longer were the elite only able to have access to education, the middle class emerged as educated. Other technologies contributed to the success of the printing press. About that time eyeglasses were in common use for those with vision problems. Gutenberg was able to take existing technologies to make his printing press operate successfully. The manufacture of paper had also improved and Gutenberg developed an oil-based ink suitable for high-quality printing.

Martin Luther’s translation of the Bible could not have been done at a better time. The printing press allowed for mass production of the texts that were available for all.

Once again, Happy Easter, St. Paul Lutheran, and congratulations on your new endeavor.

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How many times have you said or thought, “I wish I could remember what my grandmother told me about that.” If you have letters or a diary from your family, you are one of the fortunate ones. Our history of New Braunfels is almost totally based on the writings of Prince Carl, Hermann Seele, Ferdinand Roemer, Ferdinand Lindheimer and all those who told us our history because they were here. From them we learned what the town looked like, what people were doing, what they ate, how they felt, and what they thought. Even from the Spanish period in Texas we are told about routes along the Camino Real through the Comal Springs and about the missions established along the routes and how the explorers lived.

We live in what is called the communication age but you have to wonder how much of our “communication” today will be left for future generations to discover where we were and who we were. Remember that when you hit “delete” on your computer or cell text. Wonder if there is some kind of “cyber diary” out there that will be tapped in the future or will it all just be transported into outer space?

In 2013, I wrote an article about the life of Ferdinand Lindheimer, however, recently I read again A Life Among the Texas Flora by Minetta Altgelt Goyne, and decided to write more about this exceptional man. The book is a compilation of letters from Lindheimer to botanist George Engelmann.

Dr. Goyne, a descendant from some old New Braunfels families (Altgelt and Coreth), was teaching at the University of Texas at Arlington and could translate the old German script. She also knew a lot about New Braunfels history, Lindheimer and the history of Germany, all contributing to her insightful analysis published alongside the letters. The original letters are housed at the Missouri Botanical Garden at St. Louis. In 1979, the president of the New Braunfels Conservation Society approached Dr. Goyne to translate the letters. Copies of the letters had been acquired from Carlos Lindheimer, great-grandnephew of Lindheimer and native of Argentina.

Lindheimer came to New Braunfels in 1845 with Prince Carl at the age of 43. He did not travel to Texas on the ships with the first contingency of immigrants. He was already here in Texas. He was born and raised near Frankfurt, came to the United States in 1834, entering at New York. He traveled to Belleville, Illinois to the Hilgard Farm where he joined friends that had already emigrated from Germany. One of the friends was George Engelmann. Engelmann had studied medicine in Germany and had a practice in St. Louis but continued his plant studies. Engelmann and Lindheimer had studied botany together in Germany.

In the fall of 1834, Lindheimer set out from Illinois to travel south. His destination was Texas but it was considered dangerous to travel south directly into Texas from the northern route. He decided to travel to Mexico and then enter Texas from the south. He took a steamboat from Illinois down the Mississippi and arrived in New Orleans. then took a schooner to Veracruz, Mexico. He traveled to a German colony not far from Veracruz that he considered one of the most beautiful areas on earth. The German colony grew and exported sugarcane, coffee and tobacco. Lindheimer stayed there for a period of time working and observing the plantation. At that point, he thought he wanted to be a farmer.

We know that he left Mexico and enlisted in the Army of Texas, arriving with his company at San Jacinto one day too late. He received an honorable discharge at Houston on December 5, 1837. Apparently his commanding officers allowed him to collect botanical specimens while his fellow soldiers were performing drills. In 1939, he purchased a ten-acre farm near Houston not far from White Oak Bayou.

The letters to Engelmann beginning in 1841, indicate that he was accumulating equipment for his first botanizing in Texas. In 1835, while in Mexico, Lindheimer wrote to Engelmann about his interest in plants. Now in Texas, he was going to be paid to collect plant specimens and ship them to Engelmann in St. Louis.

Engelmann later organized the St. Louis Academy of Science in 1856 and what is now called the Missouri Botanical Garden. The archives house Engelmann’s plant collections and papers which include the Lindheimer letters. Many of the plant specimens collected by Lindheimer were also be sent to the famous botanist Asa Gray and actually all over the world. The Texas plants had never been collected and catalogued so completely before this time.

In the early 1840s, Lindheimer collected plants in the Houston and Galveston area, making little use of his home and living in a tent. His equipment consisted of paper, plant pressing equipment, magnifying glasses and botany textbooks. Specimens were shipped to St. Louis in wooden crates. Engelmann and Gray paid Lindheimer eight dollars per 100 specimens.

In 1842, Lindheimer wrote to Engelmann from Houston concerning the “Texas Star” flower (Lindheimeria texensis), “Did you write my name among the stars with this little Asteroid? Did I serve botany in that way? Not by knowledge of it but rather by love of this sleeping, dreaming daughter of Flora.” He continues, “So, if I die childless, then I shall nevertheless leave a little immortal daughter, the Lindheimer texensis!”

In 1843 and 1844, we find Lindheimer collecting specimens in (Wild)Cat Springs, San Felipe, Brazoria, Liverpool, the Brazos basin, Industry and the Chocolate Bayou. Wildcat or Cat Springs was established in 1834 by Robert Justus and Rosalie Roeder Kleberg. The 1831 settlement of Industry where Lindheimer visited is considered the cradle of German settlements in Texas. There was a small influx of German emigrants during most of the Republic of Texas period until the last year, when the major immigration to Texas occurred with Prince Carl.

In January 1845, Lindheimer wrote to Engelmann from the Adelsverein’s camp at Aqua Dulce. Many of the German Texans that had settled in Texas prior to the arrival of Prince Carl, joined with the prince at the coast. Then on April 18, 1845, we find that Lindheimer is writing his letter from the new German settlement on the Comal Springs. Lindheimer writes of New Braunfels, “Flower upon flower, richer than the richest Persian carpet. Fragrances that sometimes remind one of violets, often of vanilla, flow around the wanderer.”

In New Braunfels, Lindheimer reserved a piece of land for his botanical garden of Texas plants, arboretum and agricultural experiments. Under the employ of the Adelsverein, he received this farm and a house. By Christmas, he was living in a cold, poor, open hut and spending so much time on survival that he is having difficulty collecting plants. This situation was remedied when he met Eleanor Reinarz. Lindheimer described her as upright, understanding, diligent, solid, refreshing, generous and chaste. She shared in his interests and helped with his plant collecting. He wrote that in a couple of weeks, his weatherproof house will be ready alleviating the problem of moldy specimens.

From this home-base, Lindheimer traveled to the surrounding areas of San Antonio, Seguin, Austin, San Saba and the Pedernales to collect plant specimens.

Gray and Engelmann issued Plantae Lindheimerianae, Part I in 1845 and Part II in 1850, with many publications to follow. In the early 1850s, Lindheimer’s interests became more local and he spent more time raising his family with wife, Eleanor. New Braunfels was in need of a newspaper and on November 12, 1852, the first issue of the Neu-Braunfelser Zeitung was published with Lindheimer as editor. He continued botanizing to the end of his days. He died in 1879, and is buried in the Comal Cemetery. The first log home he built on Comal Avenue is no longer standing but his winterized home stands and is maintained amidst gardens by the New Braunfels Conservation Society.

Without a doubt, the letters establish why Lindheimer is considered the Father of Texas Botany.

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The Startz Café has the distinction of being one of the only small businesses in Comal County still in operation by the same family for over 50 years. They just received the Texas Treasure Business Award in 2014. They were nominated by Representative Doug Miller. This story is about how the Startz Café in Startzville came to be.

Looking at family trees can be both enlightening and mind-boggling, especially if it traces the Startz family. Their family tree reveals to me that if they had a family reunion of all the descendants, there wouldn’t be a hall big enough to hold them. The Texas story of the Startzs’ began with the arrival of Johann Startz and wife Margarethe Loeffler Startz on the first ship sent by the Adelsverein to Texas, the Johann Dethardt in 1844. Traveling with them were her three children, Katherine Loeffler, Christian Loeffler, and Louise Loeffler and the couple’s children together, Heinrich Startz, Friedricke Startz and Caroline Startz.

Johann Startz received a town lot in New Braunfels on Seguin St. but soon after arriving in New Braunfels settled in the area of Mission Hill and then moved to Smithson Valley. After Margarethe died, Johann married the widow Catherine Wenzel and they had one son together, Ludewig. It is thought that the family then moved to Buffalo Springs Settlement on the upper Guadalupe near the third river crossing.

Johann’s oldest son, Heinrich, moved to an area known as Hillview, near where our story of the Startz Café takes place. Heinrich married Louise Artzt and where they lived would later be known as Startzville. It was 17 miles northwest of New Braunfels near Tom Creek. Startz Hill, originally called Hillview, was changed to Startz Hill to honor Heinrich Startz. With its height of 1,400 feet, it is the highest point in Comal County. Later land owner, Carl D. Allen, donated the hill to Comal County and it is now named Allen Park. It was considered the first county park in Texas. From its summit, one gets a view of Smithsons Valley and a stunning view of Twin Sisters Mountains 32 miles away. Author Laurie Jasinski in “Hill Country Backroads” reveals details of an ancient sea bed which can be viewed at the park providing travelers with interesting fossils and water-formed rocks. The Sanders family found many geodes, some round and some split open revealing their crystalline centers.

This land in the hill country (Bergland in German) is what my grandmother called “the mountains”. Her description of the mountains was any place above the Balcones Escarpment. She had lots of friends in the mountains and it was a long time before I associated this area with mountains. It wasn’t what I learned in school as mountains.

Now let’s get to the Startz Café. Just down the road from Allen Park (Startz Hill) at the intersection of Cranes Mill and Sattler Road, Bruno and Viola Elbel had a cedar yard and a store in 1939. The Elbels built a house with a small grocery store inside where they sold mostly to the cedar choppers in the area. Cedar chopping was a big business. This home burned down in 1942 and so they built a rock home in its place. This was the building that Curt and Alice Schlameus Startz leased from the Elbels in 1944 and bought in 1946. Curt Startz was the son of Heinrich and Louise Startz.

In addition to the home there was an ice house which still stands, and two gasoline pumps later removed. Ice was in demand even before tourists arrived. Because Startzville was not on the Guadalupe River like other settlements, they had to rely on well water with a windmill. Also standing is a hand pump for kerosene.

Curt and Alice Startz were the sole owners of the store. Alice ran the store after Curt’s death in 1959. The Startz’s son, James Sr. and his wife Lorine, were the next generation to run the store. It was James Startz, Sr. who added the café next to the house.

The area was first called Startzville by Dr. E.J. Duffin who did a painting in 1950 of the front of the store calling it Startzville after the original members of the Startz family. By that time they had lived in the area more than 100 years. His humorous comments painted on the side of the building were: Startzville – Paradise Valley of Comal County; Population, same; Elevation, unchanged; Temperature, delightful; ice, groceries, beer. According to local author and historian, Alton Rahe, Dr. Duffin was possibly a good friend of the Startzs and owned 310 acres of land adjoining the Startz property.

With the building of Canyon Lake and Dam, nearby Cranes Mill and Hancock were submerged. Possibly the only advantage of not being on the Guadalupe River, Startzville remained and the area’s population increased as it became a tourist spot.

After the death of James Sr. and Lorine Startz, their two children assumed ownership of the business. They are James Startz Jr. and Sandra Startz Duncan. A fourth generation member of the Startz family is presently running the thriving café. She is Monica Startz Wetz, daughter of James Startz Jr.

Sandra Startz Duncan has some interesting memories of her grandmother, Alice Startz. Sandra and her brother James spent lots of time with her at the café. Like a few other early business women that I have heard of in Comal County, Alice had her opinions and didn’t mind sharing them. She was strict about a “no shoes, no shirt, no service” policy. Once she went out with a shotgun during the night when some teenage males were confiscating beer and soda and were putting them in the bed of their truck. She held them at gunpoint and used the pay-phone to call the law.

Sandra remembers activities like domino games and cards with lots of beer. She said her grandmother, although she had a “raw” sense of humor, was well liked.

Café hours are: 6am-2pm Monday, Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday; 10am-2pm Tuesday; 6am-8pm Thursday and 6am-9pm on Friday. Some of the old time family favorites include such items as Oma Startz’s (Alice) original chili and enchilada recipes, and Mamo’s (Lorine) pies like she made them.

It’s still a family operation with family members helping out. They “stayed put” and “bloomed where they were planted” in Startzville, Comal County, Texas.

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