By Myra Lee Adams Goff —

A young German count, Arnold-Henkel von Donnersmark, came to the New Braunfels settlement in 1845 with Prince Carl. He built a large frame building where he lived and conducted his hotel and saloon business. In less than a year he had accumulated several thousand dollars.

This is how he did it: he bought a barrel of whiskey in San Antonio, set up a tent in New Braunfels, and sold it to emigrants that had money. These early emigrants, having just arrived and not yet established homes, stayed in Donnersmark’s hotel, for it provided a comfortable place to stay. Besides, they liked the idea of being served by a member of the aristocracy. This would never have happened in Germany. (Source: Roemer’s “Texas”)

Donnersmark’s house, hotel, saloon, was located on the corner of Castell and Mill Sts. which is now a parking lot across the street from McAdoo’s Restaurant. Donnersmark’s house itself served a very important role in early New Braunfels because it was designated as the first post office. It was dismantled in 1904 by Louis Henne who then used the lot for a customer camp yard for his lumber, hardware, and tinning business.

C.W. Thomae was the first postmaster in 1846 and then Donnersmark took over in 1847.

In 1851 the post offices moved to the Adolphus Benner store. Benner was the postmaster and when he died, Mrs. Benner took her husband’s place, thereby having the distinction of being the first woman postmaster. She served until after the Civil War, when she was replaced due to the fact that she served under the Confederacy. (All of those positions were replaced if they had served during the Confederacy).

Next, post offices were in the bus station, Courthouse, Hermann Seele residence, and Pfeuffer store. Then in 1915 President Woodrow Wilson signed a law appropriating $50,000 to build a post office building in New Braunfels. This is the building that now houses McAdoo’s Restaurant. Guess who the U.S. Secretary of Treasury was at that time? William G. McAdoo! The present post office on Seguin Ave. was built in 1984.

In addition to the post offices in New Braunfels, there were about 20 rural post offices, two of which are at the bottom of Canyon Lake (Cranes Mill and Hancock). Each of these post offices had an individual postmark signifying that the letter had been mailed from there. Eventually all small sites were closed except New Braunfels, Spring Branch, Fischer, and Canyon Lake.

Originally stamps on letters were postmarked by the postmaster writing the cancellation date and place. Then cancellation progressed to hand stamping. Can you imagine the post office doing either one of those methods now? Cancellation then moved to digital postmarks.

These postmarked letters have become collector’s items, as everything does when it becomes obsolete. One can learn a lot about history by collecting these cancelled letters. Collectors look for old hand-cancelled letters and specific postmarks. I have seen a 28th Wurstfest postmark dated Nov 4, 1988, and a New Braunfels Sesquicentennial postmark of April 14, 1995, with the Sesquicentennial seal. A most interesting one to me is a New Braunfels Centennial celebration envelope which says “mailed from Landa Park.” It has a picture of the old Sophienburg, Las Fontanas, with the message “Because of these, the now famous Comal Springs, the German emigrants chose the site of New Braunfels.” The official postmark is New Braunfels.

Permission for special postmarks have been granted, like the commerative Pony Express rider in 2006. I have seen two stop stations, one in Gruene and one at the Schmidt Hotel.

Growing up in New Braunfels, I remember the socializing that took place on the post office steps on Castell St., especially on Saturday. Maybe this form of socializing had its roots in Arnold-Henkel von Donnersmark’s hotel and saloon across the street.

Excerpt from Around The Sophienburg by Myra Lee Adams Goff, Sophienburg Museum & Archives.

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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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By Tara V. Kohlenberg —

The summer I graduated from high school, I think the New Braunfels city limits signs boasted a population of 19,000. The county had a whopping 34,000. Since then, the city limits signs have moved further out, taking in the wonderful little communities that existed peacefully “in the country” for more than a hundred years. One such community is Freiheit.

Freiheit was first known as the San Geronimo School community. The school was in operation before 1883. In 1891, for the sum of one dollar, Henry A. Rose donated land for a school about three and a half miles northeast of New Braunfels. Located on the east corner of Prairie Lea Road (now Freiheit Road or FM 1101) and Barbarossa Road, the San Geronimo School was named for the nearby San Geronimo Creek. It was also known as Rose’s School. It was originally a one-room school, expanding to two rooms that taught first through 10th grades. In 1949, the San Geronimo School was consolidated into the Goodwin Rural High School along with Austin Hill, Church Hill, Hunter, Thorn Hill, and Watson schools. The San Geronimo school house was moved to the Goodwin Rural High School campus. It now resides at Conservation Plaza. That still doesn’t explain the Freiheit, but hang with me.

Near the San Geronimo School, at the crossroads of Eberling Lane and Prairie Lea Road, a store was opened in about 1898 or 1990 by Robert Schuenemann, the son of pioneer Fritz Schuenemann, to serve the farmers of the area. The community was known as Schuenemann Settlement. The store changed hands among Schuenemann family and ended up with Ernst Schuenemann. In 1906, Alonzo and Bessie Nolte bought the store. In January of 1910, the Noltes leased to the Freiheit Kegel Verein (Freheit Bowling Club) a 22-foot by 108-foot strip of land adjacent to their store at the cost of one dollar for 99 years. The Freiheit Kegel Verein drew up formal by-laws and elected officers in August of that same year.

This is where I tell you that the Freiheit Kegel Verein was a 9-pin bowling club. There are many differences between 9-pin and 10-pin bowling. Bowling began in 200-300 A.D. when German monks introduced bowling as a religious ritual, whereby one’s ability to knock down cones (Kegel in German) representing sins determining the need for penance. Martin Luther called the game “Kegels” and standardized it to nine pins. Nine-pin bowling was popular up until the late 19th century. Nine-pin was outlawed to stop people from gambling, but a tenth pin was added to get around the law and now we have 10-pin bowling.

In 10-pin bowling, each individual bowler throws ten frames, in the same order each time. The individual scores count. Pins are set up in a triangle where the goal is to knock down all pins. In 9-pin, it is a team sport with six team members who throw six frames. The pins are set up in a diamond configuration with the goal to knock down all but the center “kingpin”. The team captain decides the order based on the skill of each member since the frame is not reset until every pin is down. Only the team score counts. 10-pin alleys were found mostly in saloons and places frequented by men. 9-pin bowling alleys were most often built by clubs that catered to families. Freiheit Kegel Verein became synonymous with the area, and Freiheit, Texas was born.

The first Freiheit bowling building was built by club members of wood on cedar post foundation with wood shingles. The two lanes were constructed with 1-by-8 maple lumber purchased from Henne’s Hardware. Lighting was by kerosene lamps. Heat was provided by a potbelly stove. Cooling was provided by opening hinged push-open board windows.

In 1946, the club built a new, bigger building using the two old maple lanes installed in the new building along with two lanes that were purchased and moved from a San Antonio church basement. In 1963, the club broke ground on a third (current) building on adjacent acreage. Even though it is a modern facility they still use human pinsetters.

And the store? Noltes sold the store to Max and Bertha Meyers. After Hermann Ludwig returned from World War I in 1920, he and his wife Linda purchased the store from the Meyers and called it Ludwig’s Store. There was a store and a house with dance hall between. In 1927, the dance hall burned down. The store survived the depression and prohibition. In 1949, the Ludwigs tore down the old store and built the current Freiheit Country Store out of the salvaged materials. Both the store and the neighboring bowling alley often served as a polling place for Election District #16. In 1975, Kermit and Laverne Kraft bought the store, doing away with the dry goods part and promoting the bar. The next owners were Shorty and Rosie Haas in the ‘80s, who began serving burgers and promoting the family atmosphere. Freiheit Country Store was purchased by Mike Reimer and partners in 2006. They expanded the food menu and added music, becoming a restaurant and popular music venue. While being surrounded by the New Braunfels urban sprawl, the Freiheit Bowling Club and Freiheit Country Store continue to keep the community’s past alive.

Sources: Sophienburg Museum & Archives; Sophienburg Reflections Oral History Program #849; Freiheit Kegel Verein 100th Anniversary by Karen Saur Lackey; Rural Schools and Teachers in Comal County, 1854-1956 by Alton J. Rahe; www.tshaonline.org/handbook.

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Kids of all ages gravitate to superheroes. I come from a time when the superhero list was relatively short: Superman, Mighty Mouse and Sky King. My favorite was Sky King, of course. But my real heroes — the ones I pretended to be in the backyard with all my neighborhood friends — were firemen. When your family members and your friends’ family members are firemen, it seems kind of a natural thing to play. Perhaps that’s why I find the history of the New Braunfels Fire Department fascinating.

Back in January 2017, Myra Lee Adams Goff covered the early history of the fire department (from 1874 up to about 1918) in her Around the Sophienburg article, “New Braunfels Fire Department — years of service”. In 1918, the city built and outfitted a new state of the art fire station, complete with three engine bays and sleeping quarters upstairs for the first paid firemen. That station became known as Central Station. It was the heartbeat of the firefighting community, for both paid men and volunteers. As a child, Central Station WAS the fire station to me. It held the shiny red engines in its neatly painted bays with pressed tin ceilings. The bay doors were almost always open and the firemen would often sit on the metal benches out front. This station also had a tower with a siren that went off exactly at noon every day without fail (or some poor young fireman would catch heck). That siren was the signal that my Opa would be home for lunch in 5 minutes. The tower isn’t there anymore, but the original 1918 station stands ready right next to the new Central Station. That building, located at 131 Hill Ave. is now the Fire Department Museum, and you can see all the cool history inside.

As New Braunfels grew, so did the need to protect the city. A community’s fire rating (insurance rate) is based on the building codes and the fire department’s ability to reach and extinguish a fire in the shortest amount of time. In 1931, the city saw fit to build Station No. 2., the one-story building that stood on the corner of Coll and Sycamore (next to the water tower) enabling fire coverage without having to wait for a train. The station originally housed one truck (the 1913 American LaFrance moved from Central Station) and two firemen with their families. Yes, families. R. Ebensberger and Hilmar Voigt were the first to occupy the station with family living quarters. Hilmar H. H. Chili Voigt was my Opa. He and my Oma moved in for a short time when my aunt was 11 and my uncle was 5. The station was replaced with the current Station No. 2. located on Loop 337 near Solms in 1975.

Station No. 3 was in Comaltown which was annexed by New Braunfels in 1868. Comal did have a fire house on N. Houston Ave. near where Lamar school is now, but it was torn down in 1925.

In 1950 the city bought and refurbished a 2-story building on the corner of Union and Garza (now Christus’ parking lot). The building had housed Simon’s Garage & Service Station on one end and Dolle’s Saloon on the other with the Hermann Son’s Lodge upstairs. From 1925 — 1950, fire protection had to come from Central Station across the Comal River. Station No. 3 remained in service until 1983 when the current station was built on Hanz Lane.

The city passed a bond in 1968 that built Station No. 4 on Kerlick Lane. It came online in 1970, went out of service for a while and then came back into service. The current Station No. 4 was built on Alyssa Way in 2012. Stations 5 and 6 are relatively new. No. 5 was built on County Line Road before 2006 and No. 6, on Stone Gate, came online in 2008.

To give you an idea of the department’s growth, in 1918, the department operated with three to four paid men and four companies of 15 volunteers each. By 1973, there were 28 paid men and 60 volunteers. Today there are 135 paid firefighters. The volunteer organization dissolved in the early 2000’s.

My Opa started with the fire department as a volunteer in about 1922. He became a ‘paid man’ in 1931, made Assistant Chief in 1958 and retired as Fire Marshal in 1966 after 35 years on the job. He also was a house painter/paper hanger, as most firemen needed a second job to make ends meet. Both my dad and uncle were members and officers of the New Braunfels Volunteer Fire Department for over 20 years, as were many of their friends. It was a way to give back to your community. The “hero games” we played as kids revolved around what we heard and saw. We pretended that the “Plectron” would go off (an electronic notification system at each volunteer captain’s house). One of us would jump on the “truck” (bicycle) and the other would stay by the phone, activating the “phone tree.” We also practiced for Pumper Races with the garden hose. As we got older, we took pride in being able to identify any firetruck coming our way—without seeing it, just by the sound of its siren. My favorite story about Central Station involved my Opa and my uncle. During WWII my uncle had joined the Army and, after completing basic in San Antonio, the soldiers shipped out by train. No one was allowed to notify family of their new orders or duty stations. My uncle knew that the train would pass right in front of the fire station, where the men sometimes sat out front on benches. He wrote on a rock he had picked up before boarding. Just as the train pulled through downtown New Braunfels, he stepped out onto the platform and threw the rock towards the fire station. My Opa no longer worried about my uncle going overseas. The rock said, “Aberdeen, Maryland.”

Firemen were — and are — a brotherhood. They risk their lives daily to protect the community, buildings, and people from fire, flood and disaster. They work hard and play hard, but they alone know what they see in their work and they carry it with them. THEY are my heroes and their history lives in the 1918 Central Fire Station. She looks pretty grand for 100 years old.

Sources:

• Sophienburg Archives
• New Braunfels Herald
• Sophienburg “Reflections”
• New Braunfels Fire Department

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I was born in New Braunfels in 1932 on Camp Street in a home built by my grandfather. My parents were Marcus and Cola Moeller Adams. I am a fifth-generation New Braunfels, Comal County, Texas, and American citizen and proud of it.

It is 2006 and I have just been asked to write a column for the Herald-Zeitung newspaper and I am on my way to a meeting about the column.

I left my home on Camp Street where I was born, turned left on Union Avenue towards East San Antonio Street, reflecting on the changes since I grew up in New Braunfels. At this time of year (early spring), there are no river floaters and I recalled that my swimming was done almost entirely in the spring-fed pool at Landa Park and the rapids at Camp Warnecke. I don’t even remember swimming in the Comal and never in the Guadalupe. Hinman Island was a wilderness area.

Many of the homes on Union Avenue have been beautifully preserved and many are now businesses. This practice of conservation has become a satisfactory practice for homes that are now on commercial streets.

Turning right onto San Antonio Street, I drove over the old bridge towards the Plaza. I decided to drive around the Plaza, just to prove that I could do it. There used to be two-way traffic around the Plaza. All the locals knew the rules, but it sure was confusing for newcomers and visitors.

Driving through town on San Antonio Street, all the old buildings are there. I know those buildings because A.C. Moeller, my grandfather, built lots of them. His name is on the cornerstones as well as on the sidewalks. Of course, the beautiful Landa House on the Plaza is gone and on the corner of West San Antonio Street and Academy, one of the loveliest homes in town, the Holz home, gave way to changes that took place here in the late 1960s. That same era eliminated the Garwood home on Seguin Avenue and the bathhouse and other buildings in Landa Park. Those in town who see the value in historic buildings are fighting hard to save existing artifacts. Many people have witnessed the conversion to the “concrete and asphalt” jungle in other parts of the state.

Now I’m on Academy Avenue, one street within the first named historic district in New Braunfels, the Sophienburg Hill. The Sophienburg Museum and Archives is in this district and it’s where I research my facts for their column, “Around the Museum and Archives.”

Writing this column is as close as I can get to living the life of Brenda Starr, Reporter, of the comic strip of my younger days. Her character was the inspiration that began my long-time journalistic career.

In New Braunfels High School in Hallie Martin’s journalism class, my dream of being Brenda Starr was inspired when the San Antonio Light contacted her to recommend a student to report New Braunfels news to be printed in that newspaper. My friend, Phyllis Reininger and I took on the challenge. My next journalistic experience came when I was a senior and had an invitation from Helen and Joe Baldus who wanted me to write a weekly column for their newly established Town and Country News. It was embarrassingly called “Myra-Go-Round” but it could have been the launching of a history column 50 years later.

I began my study of journalism at Texas Christian University, but after a year, found out that journalism was more than Brenda Starr had portrayed. I switched my major to education to be able to teach history, German and English. I met Glyn Goff at TCU and we got married in 1952. I wanted badly to move back to New Braunfels and so we did.

I began my teaching career of 31 years in 1953. I had three children, Karen in 1956, Patty in 1959 and Marc in 1962. After staying home for eight years, I returned to teaching.

After retiring in 1991, Rosemarie Leissner Gregory and I formed a writing partnership that resulted in the publication of three books about New Braunfels history, Kindermaskenball, Past and Present; New Braunfels, Comal County, A Pictorial History; and A Journey in Faith, the History of First Protestant Church. The last book that I wrote independently was about the Comal County Fair, It’s Fair Time.

All of the research for writing these books led me to become well acquainted with the Sophienburg Museum and Archives. In 2006, Linda Dietert, Executive Director of the Sophienburg, asked me if I would be interested in writing a column about New Braunfels and Comal County history for the Herald-Zeitung. Of course, I said yes. Linda, Doug Toney and I worked out the details for a column twice a month and I have been doing that ever since for 11 years.

My creed is what my mother told me, “Always write the truth,” and “Never write down what you wouldn’t want everyone in the world to read.”

After eleven years, people are still asking me how I come up with my subjects and the answer is simply “There is no end to history and those who make it are so interesting.” I hope you have enjoyed reading this column as much as I have enjoyed writing it.

Can you just imagine how future generations will view us? Change will happen and the “good old days” are now. I love living in New Braunfels. “In Neu Braunfels ist das leben schön.”

On Tuesday, May 23^rd from 2-4 pm, a special event will occur at the Sophienburg. This event is the release of the book, Around the Sophienburg and it contains all of the articles that I have written over the past 11 years. It also contains the photographs that appeared in the newspaper. My daughter, Patty, painted the artwork for the cover and illustrated 26 pictures that will be on display on the 23^rd. Due to the generosity of some special Sophienburg donors, the cost of the publishing of the book was underwritten so all proceeds go to benefit the Sophienburg Museum and Archives. Many people over the years have cut the articles out of the newspaper and saved them in very large notebooks. The published book contains over 250 articles and photos and is almost 500 pages.

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Dr. Ferdinand Roemer in his book “Roemer’s Texas,” when he arrived in the village of New Braunfels in 1846, wrote that a speculative American had laid out a new city in between the fork of the Comal and the Guadalupe within view of the city of New Braunfels and it was called Comaltown. This American citizen was Daniel Murchison, a land agent for Maria Antonia Veramendi and her husband Rafael Garza. Maria Veramendi Garza was the daughter of Juan Veramendi, governor of Texas under the Mexican regime who had received this land grant.

When Prince Carl laid out the city of New Braunfels on the west bank of the Comal, the Garzas laid out their inheritance on the east side of the Comal. Although Comaltown was separated from New Braunfels by water, it was soon annexed to the city of NB.

There has been very little history written about this thriving community so David Hartmann and I have begun a research project about Comaltown. We are collecting information on people, businesses, schools, churches, recreational activities and much more. David and I have a lot in common, including sharing a common ancestor here in Comaltown, Johann Georg Moeller (1844). We both grew up in this area and attended Lamar School. But when David went to Lamar, I was teaching there. David was in my music class at Lamar and so was Angie Morales, the daughter of Charlie and Francisca Morales who owned Morales Funeral Home on Common St. The funeral home was the first business that we researched in our new project.

The Morales Funeral Home, which was located at 171 Common St., was a thriving business until it was closed. Angie Morales (Kieny) was its last director and mortician. Her parents were Charlie and Francisca Sanchez Morales. Charlie was born in 1897 in Gruene and Francisca in Laredo in 1903. Together the couple had seven children. Angie, who was born in 1945, was the youngest. The other children are Carlota, Alfonso, Virginia, Francis, Martha, and Henry.

In 1921, Charlie Morales bought the property on which the Morales Funeral Home would be located. On the property was a small Sunday House and next to that was a two-story structure which, over the years, had served as a saloon downstairs and a small hotel with rooms for rent upstairs. There was a full basement for making wine and beer. Attached to this two-story building was another one-story addition probably used as a residence for the innkeeper. The buildings were constructed in the true German fachwerk style of clay bricks and cross timber. The clay used was plentiful in the Comaltown area, as many buildings were made of this easy-to-get material.

There is no information on the early owners, however, on the 1881 bird’s-eye view map of New Braunfels, the buildings can clearly be seen. They probably date back to the mid-1800s. They were at one time considered the oldest surviving buildings in Comaltown.

When Charlie Morales purchased the property, he removed the second story of the two- story building, probably due to the fragility of the clay. Other buildings in the area were converted to one-story due to the same situation. The basement became a cellar for can goods and vegetables. The Morales family lived in the remodeled structure and the other side became a funeral home in 1922. All of the Morales children were born at home.

Before buying the funeral home property, Charlie had worked for local contractors along with Rich Moeller. David Hartmann speculates that they worked for the Moeller Brothers Contracting firm consisting of Adolph and Alvin C. Moeller. All lived in the Comaltown area and Rich Moeller was a relative of the brothers.

Charlie Morales had several brothers who owned funeral homes in San Antonio, Austin, and Houston and so the mortician occupation was not new to him. Over the years over 30 family members were involved in the funeral business.

Angie grew up helping her dad and learning from him. She graduated from New Braunfels High School in 1965 and received her mortician’s license from the Commonwealth College of Science in Houston, doing an apprenticeship at Earthman’s Funeral Homes in Houston. Then in 1969 Angie returned to her hometown, New Braunfels, to help her father who retired, but remained active in the business. She became the first female funeral director and mortician in New Braunfels. She remembers some interesting times and she remembers hard times. Many families, due to lack of money, paid Charlie by bringing eggs, chickens, and even a goat. Some could not pay but received the funeral service anyway. Charlie Morales died in 1975.

To Angie, being a full time mortician and raising a family was no easy job. She remembers driving the hearse that the family named “Nellie Belle” hauling around young children that she helped raise.

Angie Morales maintained the funeral director position until 2006 when she closed the funeral home and turned the property over to her son. The buildings were subsequently torn down to make room for condominiums.

Most of the funeral records have been retained by Angie. Her former classmate at NBHS, Estella Delgado Farias, asked to make copies of the funeral home records. Estella was the person who did the research on the West End Hall and Baseball Parks. Angie agreed and Estella said that most of the 7,000 people in the records were buried in the Our Lady of Perpetual Help and Panteon Hidalgo Cemeteries. She also related that most of the funerals were conducted by the Morales Funeral Home. Estella and her husband, Robert Farias, are now working on the information which they are entering into a database. They are also searching for missing information and eventually will make all of this information available to the public at the Sophienburg Museum and Archives.

David and I are off to a running start. Well, maybe not exactly running, but we’re getting there. If you have information and pictures of Comaltown, we would love to use them.

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