I’m writing about iconology, the study of icons. The word “icon” has been stretched thin over the years. Originally it referred to “a painting of religious personages on a wooden panel in the Eastern Church”. In advertising, we have icons for almost everything. Christmas icons are the symbols that make us think of Christmas.

Go all the way back to the 1844 emigrant landing on the coast at Indianola. Soon after, at Christmas time, a coastal oak tree was procured and covered with candles. The lighted tree as an important icon lives on. Protestant Reformer Martin Luther is given credit for the lighted tree when he noticed the brilliance of the stars peeking through the snow-covered trees. He rushed home to put candles on his fir tree.

The Puritans were against decorations, including trees, but when German and Irish emigrants arrived in America, the Puritan legacy was stamped out by long-standing ethnic traditions. Meanwhile in the Texas Hill Country, the only tree that came close to resembling the fir tree was the “don’t touch me, I have stickers” juniper. Christmas trees changed from juniper, to imported fir trees, to artificial trees.

Candles were the only tree lights until electricity was invented around the turn of the 20th century. Those early electric lights were problematic; if one globe went out, the whole string went out. Much time was spent looking for that one burned-out globe. With time, that problem was solved and now we have LED lights.

Decorations, too, have changed over the years. The Sophienburg has some glass globes brought from Germany. Fast forward to the 1920s, before children chewed on trees, some very dangerous decorations appeared on the scene. For example, there was spun glass called angel hair, tinsel icicles made of lead, and globes made of mercury glass.

In America the most iconic symbol of children’s Christmas is Santa Claus. Long before the big guy dressed in red and was made famous by an illustration by Haddon Sundblom for Coca Cola, a similar character appeared in Europe. He was Saint Nicholas and his story was brought by the settlers from Germany. The more judgmental Nicholas filled stockings hung somewhere in the house on Dec. 5th with candy and fruit for good children and a switch or a potato or a piece of coal for a “bad” child. But “bad or good” there was hope for all children because there was still two weeks to straighten up before Santa Claus came.

Locally, Bill Vollmar was given much credit for bringing Santa Claus to New Braunfels. Vollmar owned a local 5 and 10 cent store. The picture shows Santa arriving on a train. Hearsay says he also arrived in an airplane and, of course, the vehicle of choice was not a reindeer, but a fire truck.

Gift giving has always been a big part of the holidays. Here’s a short list of advertised gifts: a Kodak camera at Voelkers Drug Store (1898); Tigress, Woodhue, and Tabu perfumes plus Tangee lipstick (1940s); hand carved dolls and marbles (ancient cultures).

Stores had toys for sale, but the first toy store was Tante Amelia’s Christmas Store next to Henne Hardware. Tante was a sister to the Hennes and the toy store was only open for two weeks. When it wasn’t a toy store, it held kitchen supplies.

Church activities dominated the Christmas season. The Germans celebrated Christmas Eve with a light supper and then gift opening. In the old days the tree was closed off to children until the gift opening ceremony. This was the first time that children saw the tree and gifts. A midnight candlelight church service followed.

In the Catholic Hispanic community, Dec. 24th was a time for friends and neighbors gathering together at one home. They would have a rosary by the nativity scene at the home and place the baby Jesus in the empty crib to remain there until Feb. 2nd. Another tradition was Las Posadas (the Inns), an old ceremony commemorating the journey of Mary and Joseph as they sought lodging preparing for the birth of Jesus.

As more and more Americans moved to New Braunfels, traditions gradually blended together. New Braunfelsers have their own icons of German, Hispanic, and American origin. Tamales, chili, poinsettias, sausage, cookies, pralines, divinity, toffee, piñatas, bells, all blend together, so–

Fröliche Weihnachten, Feliz Navidad, and a New Braunfels Merry Christmas to all!

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Don’t we all love the feeling of an old-fashioned Christmas? Once again, the Sophienburg has decorated for the Christmas season, but this year wins the prize.

The collection and exhibit ladies have put together a dollhouse display of 14 different dollhouses plus small doll collections.

Entering the foyer is a large dollhouse at one time belonging to the late Bill and Nan Dillon. The house is decorated with furniture representing the 1870s to present day. Furniture includes Bentwood chairs from the 1900s and handmade furniture. Immediately across from this house is a unique “garden home” from the 1800s. The table and chairs are set with a tiny tea set.

Also in the foyer, a nine-foot tree holds a collection of 90 plus small dolls from around the world. This collection was given to the Sophienburg years ago by the late Thekla Wright. She and her husband, Dr. Rennie Wright, collected these dolls in their vast travels.

Next is a three-storied Victorian style house built by Richard and Merlene Hitz for Allison Humphries, daughter of Mike and Linda Dietert.  This house with its furnishings dating from 1990 to 2000 can be viewed from the front and the back.

Enter the Museum where there is a replica of an early cabin showing an old fashioned pioneer home.  Christmas at the Waisenhaus (orphanage) of Rev. Louis and Luise Ervendberg has been recreated. For many years, the Timmermann sisters of Geronimo, who were descendants of the Ervendbergs, created this scene at Christmastime for many to see. Underneath the cedar tree decorated with candy and cookies is an elaborate Nativity at Bethlehem. The tree is surrounded by honeycomb rocks, which was a common practice in New Braunfels.

Inside the “Newspaper” display area is a folding paper dollhouse, a 1990 reproduction of an 1890 Victorian house belonging to archivist Keva Boardman. This dollhouse is easily moved from one place to another.

Perhaps the most unusual of all the displayed houses is in the museum’s “Pharmacy” section. It is a house made of a packing crate containing packages of coconut. After the packages were sold, the remaining crate revealed lithographs of the inside of a house. The crate, when stood on end, represented four rooms. Shelley Weidner owns the Coconut House, at one time belonging to twins Carmen (Lee) and Cosima (Langwell) Schnable.

In the “Saloon” is a model of the old Sophienburg Museum made by a student and in the “Barbershop” is a boy’s version of a dollhouse – a metal 1960s barn and silo from the Jerome Bodeman collection. Moving on to the “Doctor’s Office” you see a Dura-craft 1970s dollhouse made from a kit furnished with items from 1980s and ’90s.

In the 1960s, the trend in dollhouses was to make them of metal. One displayed belongs to Yvonne Rahe and one belongs to Meredeth Neiman. Plastic and metal furniture became popular at this time. In the “General Store” there is a plywood house made from a kit.

My dollhouse given to me in 1934 by my grandfather, builder A.C. Moeller, actually has electric lights (Christmas tree lights from the ’30s). The dollhouse was constructed by Richard Ikels, who was the cabinetmaker for him. Patterned in the bungalow style of the time, it contains arches separating the six rooms plus stucco walls and hardwood floors. The original wooden furniture remains in my memory only. Present furnishings were collected by Goff daughters and granddaughters.

Upon exiting the Museum, one sees a two-room 1920s house owned by Betty Stobaugh. The house was constructed by Betty’s father and all the furnishings were ordered from Germany.

Finally a wardrobe from the museum collection is filled with small dolls and next to it a feather tree holding a tiny baby doll collection.

The exhibit will be open all of December. The price is $5 per person; or you could come to The St. Nick celebration on Dec. 5 for $5 a family.

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By Keva Hoffmann Boardman —

Ah … the Christ­mas hol­i­days are near­ing their end and I am feel­ing the peace and joy of the sea­son. I am sit­ting back and rem­i­nisc­ing Christ­mases past. I tell my­self that I should write some of this down; or maybe some­day I will be recorded for all to re­mem­ber!

The Re­flec­tions Oral His­tory pro­gram of the So­phien­burg Mu­seum cap­tures such mem­o­ries and sto­ries of the lives of peo­ple who have lived in New Braun­fels and Co­mal County. Many sub­jects have been cov­ered that re­flect events and mo­ments of the late 19th and 20th cen­turies.

And we con­tinue to col­lect and record the sto­ries to­day.

Thumb­ing through the oral his­tory in­dex, I found a record­ing from 1980 by Erna Hei­de­meyer Ro­hde (1896-1993) and Emma Roth Wille (1895-1986). Their tales of early 20th cen­tury hol­i­day mem­o­ries re­flect a pre­cious, slower time full of close-knit fam­i­lies and time-hon­ored tra­di­tions. You can lis­ten to their en­tire record­ing, #202, at the Mu­seum or NB Pub­lic Li­brary, but I will give you a tiny taste of what they shared. I be­gin with Erna Ro­hde:

The store I remember best and probably have the fondest memories of was the Henne Weihnachts store … a Christmas store that was a very popular place once a year when we children were allowed to go and look at the presents and the toys and so forth that they had for sale in it. It was only opened from the evening of St. Nikolaus night and closed again right after Christmas … it stayed closed until the next St. Nikolaus night. Everybody went to view the toys and try to influence Mama and Papa to buy such presents for us for Christmas.

Sister to Louis Henne, Tante Amalie Henne ordered toys from New York and set up the Christmas store in the building next to Henne’s across the alley. She would cover the store windows so that no one saw the dolls, stuffed horses, wagons, marbles and other lovely, desired playthings until the St. Nikolaus’ Eve grand opening. In the photo, you can see that some toys were then put out on the porch and sidewalk to entice customers. Erna continues her story:

There was no other place in town where you could buy Christmas presents … toys and dolls … of course it was a great anticipation for us kids to wait for that night [Dec. 5] to come, and we were fortunately living right in town just a block away from there. Our father and mother took us younger ones to the store.

We would try to get there first … sometimes stood in line with 20-30 people ahead of you. That was a lot of people at that time since our town had approximately 5000 inhabitants. As you walked in, there was a counter to the left … and above it on the walls were shelves. That is where they had their dolls, all kinds of dolls, all sizes, all prices. Each doll was in a cardboard box, and then it was stood up against the wall so that the doll would be standing up inside the box.

We would go there with our mamas and papas and look at them and wish we could have one and beg for them and so forth; and then finally when I guess the parents had decided that they ought to get together and see what they could buy for us, we kids were sent on down in the little store. We could look at the other presents and gifts, but it was really impressed upon us that we were not allowed to touch anything and we didn’t. If I child would forget, which was rare, Tante Amalie was always standing by to gently tell them to look and not touch. And then, once we wandered off into another part of the store, our parents would go over and whisper to Tante Amalie to put that particular doll or toy aside until they could get back to pick it up.

When Christmas came, and we saw the doll or toy in our pile underneath the tree, the one we had seen and hoped for in the Weihnachts store, we were very, very happy. Our gifts were never wrapped and if there was more than one child in the family, everyone had a little corner or space. We did not see the Christmas tree until the night of Christmas Eve. The door would be closed or a sheet was hung up so we couldn’t look through and see the presents and tree until Christmas Eve.

Tante Amalie never married and was always referred to as a spinster. Photos of Tante Amalie show a rather stern-looking, serious woman, not someone children would hold dear and run up and hug. But, the children were not afraid of her — they loved her and their respect for her made them behave in her store.

Mrs. Emma Wille also shared beautiful rich memories of Christmas in her family on this recording. She, too, remembered Tante Amalie’s store and Christmas Eve:

I don’t know of any other town in the area where they had a similar occasion to open a toy store right before Christmas. It was very unusual. When we knew the store was open then there was no rest until we were there. And it was St. Nikolaus night! We hung up stockings and we got fruit and cake and cookies and maybe a nickel, no presents at that time. And people would dress up and come to the door and bring us fruit and candies and things like that. It was usually older children or people.

We also got our presents on Christmas Eve, that was the style, and then we went to Midnight Mass at the church. Papa would hitch up the horse and buggy and took the whole family to church. The Protestants were there too since their church did not have services at midnight. The Catholic church was the only one that had a nativity scene at that time.

And then there was second Christmas day, the day after Christmas, 26th of December, and we would go visiting our friends. We would see what they got for Christmas and look at their Christmas tree and see if their cookies were as good as ours. We usually got cookies and ginger ale at the different houses. Ginger ale was a special holiday thing. Sometime in December, Mr. Weidner would come around. He had a soda factory, a bottling works, and he would take orders for us and bring it for the holidays. Also, oranges and apples. They came by the boxes.

I just love how Christmas was such a very special time. Its wonder, its decorations and its surprise gifts were not taken for granted back in the days when Erna and Emma were children. Imagine waiting all year for the toy store to open!

Hearing about their anticipation and happiness has warmed my heart.

Have a Happy and blessed New Year!

Sources: Reflections oral history program #202; New Braunfels Herald-Zeitung, December 18, 1980.

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

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The Sophienburg Museum celebrates the Christmas season by presenting an exhibit of dollhouses, old toys and dolls, all reminiscent of our Christmas Past. Dollhouses appeared on the scene all over the world hundreds of years ago. In their beginning, they were not toys; they were much too expensive to allow children to play with. Dollhouses were actually works of art, just like paintings, sculptures and any other art form.

They were at one time, present in royal palaces and homes of rich aristocrats. Precisely constructed details obviously called for high prices that only the rich could afford. Very old examples of dollhouses can be now found in museums and antique stores. Now when you think about it, it’s probably because the dollhouses weren’t toys, that they survived.

Few toys survive the agony of childhood. My Shirley Temple doll never looked the same after I cut off all her curls. Of course, she never made the display cases.

Nuremberg, Germany and Paris, France, were best known for dollhouse production. Often, they were gifts of the groom to his bride. Now get this, these gifts were to replicate the home from which she came. It was supposed to keep her from being homesick. Don’t laugh. That may work, because children and adults alike, when playing with a dollhouse, imagine that they are there. Children put little people in the house and they become the characters that they create.

According to collectors, the most famous of all dollhouses is now in Windsor Palace. It is the Queen Mary’s House given to the queen by her subjects for helping them during a war. Carpets, furniture and wall paper are exact copies of items used during the reign of Queen Mary. Some unusual items in the house are a collection of 300 miniature books by famous authors and a gramophone that plays, “God Save the Queen.” The cellar is stocked with are real bottles of wine and the kitchen and bath have hot and cold running water. Famous houses like these are often on display in museums.

I have to admit that the Sophienburg is not exactly Windsor Palace, but let’s get to what we have to show in the Museum. After entering the foyer, there is the Bill and Nan Dillen house given by this very generous couple in New Braunfels, years ago. They are both deceased, but their generous gifts to New Braunfels live on. This very large house was used as a display for their antique doll furniture. Each room in the three-story house represents a different style of furnishings. The first floor shows furnishings of the 1870s, using furniture of wood with original blue silk upholstery. The klismos-style chairs are based on an antique Greek model popular with early German furniture makers. Also, present in the library is furniture made of cast iron used for both miniature and real furniture in Germany.

The second floor, features more functional furniture from about 1919, emphasizing usefulness and craftsmanship. The third-floor attic has recycled furniture, from around

1935. People would often make dollhouse furniture from discarded items found around the house. Cigar boxes, tin cans and clothespins were repurposed into useful “arts and crafty” items. This house is a magnificent beginning for the rest of the display.

Go into the Museum and there are two after the turn-of-century houses, the Stobaugh-Reeves house and the Roby-Hall House. The Stobaugh-Reeves House was constructed in the 1920s by the grandfather of Janet Reeves for her mother, Betty Zauel Stobaugh. Much of the furnishings were purchased in Germany. The old-fashioned stove is really a work of art. My grandmother had a stove that looked very much like this iron creation. On the dining room table, there are tiny pewter dishes. In the bedroom is the tiniest chamber pot that I have ever seen. We all know the function of the chamber pot. And aren’t we glad that they are a thing of the past.

Historical events did not allow for the production of dollhouses between World War I and World War II. After World War II, doll houses were increasingly mass produced, thereby making them less expensive and more available to the public. They became the toy of choice for little girls. I am very proud to share my 1934 dollhouse with the exhibit. It was built for me by my grandfather, A.C. Moeller. He was a builder of many buildings in downtown New Braunfels as well as houses all over town. I can recognize houses built by him because he built using the craftsmen style. My house is that style so I am well-acquainted with it.

My two-story doll house represents the 1930s era in many ways. Complete with hardwood floors and electric lights, the six-room dollhouse now contains more recently made furniture, as all of the original furnishing were made of wood and deteriorated. I couldn’t move the doll house outside because it was too big, but I could move the furniture. I would set up villages under the shrubs and now I store the furnishings only in my brain. The indoor bathroom is one of the most interesting with its claw-footed bathtub. The original tub was “built in” and so this claw-footed model goes back in time to the 1900s.

Most of the other houses in the museum are incorporated into the individual displays. We skip to the 1960s, when handmade went to factory-made. In the 1980s and 90s, tin and plastic became the material of choice and dollhouses now come in kits. Disney characters have moved into the houses.

Throughout the museum there are other collections. The indoor cabin in the museum is all decked out with old dolls, toys and a fine collection of antique children’s rocking chairs.

Once again, the Sophienburg will celebrate St. Nicolas Eve on Monday, December 5^th. This will be your opportunity to visit the Museum at the same time and for the same price. The price is $5.00 a family. Due to space, there will be two shows only, one at 6:00 and one at 7:30 p.m. You need to call the museum at 830-629-1572 to make a reservation for your family visit. St. Nicholas will make a visit, teach some German, sing songs and then have treats afterwards. Only 35 children will be allowed for each of the two programs, so make your reservation soon. Hope to see you there.

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