New Braunfels’ Fourth of July celebrations, then and now
(This is a special edition of Around the Sophienburg for the 250th anniversary of the U.S. Declaration of Independence.) By Tara V. Kohlenberg — Today, July 4, 2026, marks 250 years since the signing of the Declaration of Independence. America’s 250th birthday. New Braunfels has celebrated America’s birthday for 170 years. The celebrations have changed […]
2026 Myra Lee Adams Goff Scholarship Award
2026 Myra Lee Adams Goff Scholarship Award Essay – by Jaelynn Davidson The Texas Hill Country was a stunning and dangerous arena of cultural conflict in the mid-19th century. To the Texas nobility of the Adelsverein, it was a fantasy of a “New Germany”; to the German peasants who arrived on the shores of the […]
Lost map becomes found treasure
Detail of K. W. Pressler & W. Völker 1851 map of Texas. This map was issued as part of G. M. von Ross’ 1851 book, Der Nordamerikanische Freistaat Texas. By Keva Hoffmann Boardman — Among a stack of “orphaned” papers, I found an old map of Texas. “Orphans” are those papers or artifacts that either […]
Scholl Peters house gone missing
By Tara V. Kohlenberg — I watch rooftops multiply daily as I look out from our house of more than 30 years. I will not lie. It is distressing. It truly makes me appreciate the beautiful well-built 100-plus-year-old buildings that grace our city. Being a native, I often wonder what has become of the many […]
Furniture sold here since 1902
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 […]
History of the Moeller House
By Tara V. Kohlenberg — New Braunfels historians have told us that the first immigrants arrived with very little in the way of belongings. And, unlike today’s new arrivals in New Braunfels, our founding ancestors had a lot to do before settling into a house. They had to secure materials (chop trees for lumber, make […]
New Braunfels treasure celebrates 90 years
By Tara V. Kohlenberg — A 90th birthday is an event well worth celebrating. My beautiful friend was born in 1933, the same year as Willie Nelson and Carol Burnett. It was the worst year of the Great Depression, when twenty-five percent of the labor force was unemployed, the U.S. bank system failed, and the […]
1881 bird’s-eye view of New Braunfels
By Keva Hoffmann Boardman — Created by Augustus Koch in 1881, the “Birds Eye View of New Braunfels” is so much more than just an etching of early New Braunfels. An aerial view of the city lying nestled between the rise of the Balcones Escarpment and the black dirt farmlands, it is almost photographic […]
Early German immigrants faced tough times at Christmas
By Myra Lee Adams Goff — The year is 1849, just five years after the first emigrants arrived on the Texas coast. Hermann Seele has been invited to spend December 26th with Pastor L.C. Ervendberg, his wife Luise, their five children, and the 19 orphans left parentless by the devastating immigration conditions beginning in 1846. The […]
Yet another rip-roaring July 4th celebration
By Myra Lee Adams Goff — Historically, the first July 4th celebration in New Braunfels goes back to 1846. The emigrants had arrived only three months earlier on March 21, 1845, when Texas was still the Republic of Texas. Now, in 1846 they could celebrate the national festival commemorating the signing of the Declaration of […]
