From Union St., turn onto Common and drive straight to the Guadalupe River. At the bridge and on the east side of the river, as far as you can see, look left and right. You are looking at Hortontown. Down river to the right of Hortontown was Neighborsville. These two areas are referred to by these names only historically. Beginning in 1846, when sickness was rampant on the coast and in New Braunfels, and emigrants were still arriving, Hortontown was settled to avoid going into the sickness- infested town. Neighborsville followed a few years later. Both areas were originally in Guadalupe County but were added to Comal County and also to the City of New Braunfels.

From the bridge, you will notice a gradual incline up to Loop 337. Turn right on the loop, and right before the railroad overpass, turn left on Church Hill Drive. Across the road from Conservation Plaza, a church was built in 1852. It was the St. Martin’s Evangelical Lutheran Church and next to it, in 1870, a school was built. The Church Hill School served the children of both Hortontown and Neighborsville.

Hortontown was named after Albert C. Horton who came to Texas from Alabama in 1835. He became an active supporter of the Texas Revolution. From 1836-38 he served as senator in the 1st and 2nd congress of the Republic of Texas. He became the first Lt. Gov. of the new state of Texas. Leopold Iwonski became the agent for Horton’s land grant.

The settlement of Neighborsville was laid out by Jacob de Cordoba who designated a lot for the establishment of the church and parochial school. In 1870 the church congregation decided to build a separate building for their school. And that school became the Church Hill School.

The Church Hill School was built of 18” thick hand- cut limestone blocks brought by wagon from a hill country quarry. The doors and floor are also original. The appointments are from other rural Comal County one-room schools.

Martha Rehler, Exec. Director of the Conservation Society, took me on a tour. There is nothing as empty as an empty classroom. Going into the abandoned school, that strange feeling returned. A classroom needs children.

There were wooden desks of all sizes with a hole in the top for an ink bottle. They still had those when I was in elementary school. Our fountain pens had a little bladder that had to be filled with ink. What a mess! In this old classroom the teacher sat in the back of the room by the door. I’m surprised she didn’t notice the initials carved in the older students’ desk, probably by a pocket knife which I’m told, was every boy’s toy. Slate boards were on each desk taking the place of paper. The large chalkboard (black, later green) had the lesson for the day in German script (Fraktur).

Other relics are a long table from the Ursaline Academy in San Antonio displaying photographs of groups of school children. Water was drawn out of a well or a cistern and put in a portable water fountain. There are two large bells. The smaller of the two at one time stood in front of the Guadalupe Hotel (Plaza) which was a stagecoach stop. The bell was used to welcome arrivals. The larger was a school bell to call students.

Rehler gave me a “Texas Public School’s Report Card from 1925 that parents had to fill out about their own child. It was for a 7th grade girl going into the 8th grade. I put myself in my mother’s shoes, evaluating her only chick on a scale of 1 to 100. Knowing that I was a “city girl” in New Braunfels, I would have failed miserably. I would have a “0” in canning, care of stock, care of poultry, cooking, gardening, general farm work, milking, providing fuel, sewing, and sweeping,. I would have done fairly well in dusting, washing dishes, obedience, neatness, reliability and special work. In my case, special work would have been socializing.

The St. Martin’s Church, originally adjoined to the old Church Hill School, was moved in 1968 next to the Hortontown Cemetery on Loop 337. The school remained and was eventually donated to the Conservation Society in 1975 to be used as a museum.

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Occasionally, I need to look through the Sophienburg’s newspaper collection. The papers, on microfilm, date from 1852 to present day; it is an amazing resource. Often, an unrelated search sends me “down a bunny trail” (of course, I follow!). As I was researching pigeons a couple columns back, I came across Dr. Grube. His name was familiar to me because there are several artifacts in the Museum collections associated with him: a wood box overlaid with sliced deer horn, an engraved watch fob, a meerschaum cigar holder, and some cut-glass steins. So I began to wonder, who was this guy?

A name search in the news index revealed over 80 mentions for Dr. Otto R. Grube in the Neu Braunfelser Zeitung, from 1876-1902. The advertisements, small articles, and one sentence reports in Locales (Local news), gave me a sense of what the everyday life of this local physician was like. This good doctor was a busy, busy man.

The paper announced in November 1876, that Dr. Grube had taken over Dr. Lehde’s medical practice. The practice remained in Dr. Lehde’s home, but Otto made many house calls. During 1877, Dr. Grube rode his horse 10 miles south of New Braunfels to Santa Clara to cure the Helmke child of nervous fever, moved his office to the Voges home on Castell Street, and joined Dr. Claessan in performing an autopsy. The theft of Otto’s horse from in front of the Guadalupe Hotel (Schmitz) during a failed robbery attempt definitely made news in July. Later that fall, he joined the Turnverein (Athletic Club) and the Saengerverein (Singing Society). He was fitting into the New Braunfels “scene” quite nicely.

The Zeitung printed a thank you to Grube in February 1878 for his “special attention and services rendered” during Mrs. Roessing’s illness. That spring, advertisements reminded townsfolk that he was giving smallpox vaccinations during the lunch hour each day at Voelcker’s Drugstore. He is involved in the November murder investigation at the Breustedt Farm, 6 miles from downtown; called in to examine a woman’s body found in the well, he determined that her head had been beaten in with the “weapon” found near her. The murderer turned out to be the woman’s husband, a Polish man, who worked on the farm. (Talk about a bunny trail!) Grube removed Dr. Claessan’s finger in December — it had become infected during an earlier operation.

In 1879, Dr. Grube assisted several San Antonio physicians in a hernia operation; this was considered “major surgery”. Later that year, his neighbor’s dog was poisoned, he was appointed to the examiners board to hire English-speaking teachers, and he amputated Mrs. Seele’s foot after it was badly broken in a wagon accident.

He treated Mrs. Eiband’s lung disease until her death and got politically involved in 1880. He went to Galveston and Dallas as a delegate to the Democratic Convention. He also took ownership of a beautiful, hand-crafted coach made by “blacksmith Galle and wagon maker Mueller, with lacquer-work done by Streuer”. He and his friends survived a “mule and ambulance” accident on the way to a Saengerverein event and that summer he worked on the fair planning committee.

Advertisements in 1881, announced that Dr. Grube was a “family doctor.” He helped reestablish the local masonic lodge. That summer he and Mr. Voelcker began a soda water business. He treated Mr. Glenewinkle’s arm after a thrashing machine mishap and he served as coroner for the intentional morphine overdose of Lee Wilson at Ludwig’s boarding house.

1882 was a difficult year for Dr. Grube. First, he served as pallbearer for his good friend, Dr. Claessen. Next, he treated the wound of M. Starcke’s 12-year-old son after he was accidentally shot by his 14-year-old brother. In November, he travelled all the way to Laredo to treat Judge Pfeuffer’s son, George. (That’s one heck of a house call!). Then in 1883, Grube’s 12-year-old brother-in-law, John Dyer, was shot by Alfred Rheinlaender.

Personal tragedy struck again in March 1885, when Grube’s wife died suddenly at age 30; he buried her with her family in New Orleans. That summer, he treated Mrs. Waldschmidt after a terrible accident. While she was milking a cow, it tried to butt away her dog. She was knocked down instead and suffered a serious “wound” because she was pregnant. At the same time, Dr. Grube cared for the son of Mr. Hildebrand who had shot himself in the head with a shotgun. After the last few months it was not surprising to read in the newspaper that Grube gave his practice to Dr. Underhill and moved to New Orleans in November. The Zeitung reported that “the town would truly miss him.”

And then, in May 1895, Dr. Grube returned to New Braunfels. He set up his practice in Voelcker’s Drugstore and specialized in the diseases of women and children.

In 1896, Grube was reported to have tried a telephone connection between New Braunfels and Blanco. New Braunfels had been connected to San Antonio since January. He continued to give smallpox vaccinations and once again was elected to be a delegate to the Democratic Convention.

He bought shares in the Comal County Fair Association in 1899 and became the president of the Schuetzenverein (Shooting Club). Most importantly, Otto Grube married Emmy Weber in a December ceremony. He was 50; Emmy was 28.

1902 saw a rise in smallpox cases. Dr. Grube, the Comal County Health Officer, reported on the victims: Tausch’s daughter, 2 Catholic nuns, Kern’s son, 1 member of the Lueder family, 2 of Albrecht’s daughters, and 3 Mexican workers on the Kuehler Farm.

Dr. Otto R. Grube died July 8, 1902, of kidney failure, and was buried in Comal Cemetery. His second wife, Emmy, lived until November 23, 1956.

Now I wonder how much of my life — or yours — is recorded in the newspaper.

Sources:

• Neu Braunfelser Zeitung microfilm collection
• First Protestant Church records
• US Census reports
• The Portal to Texas History https://texashistory.unt.edu

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The New Braunfels Fire Department is celebrating its 130^th year of service to the New Braunfels people.

In 1886, Hermann Seele was named the chairman of the Fire Committee of the City Council by Mayor Joseph Faust. The purpose of the committee was to form fire protection for the people of New Braunfels. Seele had been on the Waterworks Committee for the city and now with the waterworks accomplished, a fire department could be established.

Just two months later, the mayor announced in the newspaper that the city had taken steps to acquire hose reel and hook and ladder equipment for fighting fires. Then two days after this announcement, on June 6, 1886, Seele announced that the New Braunfels Volunteer Fire Department was formed.

At the first meeting set up by Seele and Faust to form the department, forty interested young men showed up. The decision was to form two hose and reel companies and one hook and ladder company. Two bells on towers would be mounted in the north and south ends of town with a hose shed underneath to house the hose and pump cart. Obviously, the bells would ring to alert the firemen to a fire. One of the hose reel carts and a bell tower was stationed where Lamar School is now. Another was on the south side of town and a third one was located downtown. The hook and ladder hose reel equipment and bell tower downtown was first located next to the first courthouse where Chase Bank is now. When the present courthouse was built in 1898, the bell tower and shed were moved to that location and then in 1918 when the first fire station was built on Hill Avenue, the bell tower was moved there. We know these locations from looking at old photographs and also viewing the Sanborn Fire Insurance maps that showed the firefighting equipment locations as well as where the water mains were located in the street.

The need for such a service was so great that a list of 46 names was suggested as candidates for membership of this volunteer fire department. Each company, of around 15 men, would be a part of three companies. The company was frequently named after the citizen who paid for the equipment, hence, the Moreau (Franz) Hook and Ladder company.

The chief of the department was William Schmidt with S.V. Pfeuffer named as secretary. Paying for the equipment was quite a challenge and after working hard on this detail, only $323 was collected. After a month, the department purchased two hose reel carts, two one-inch nozzles, one bell, and as much 2 ½-inch hose as they could afford. A dance was held to raise funds for the second bell. In my family, both the Moeller and the Adams families were active in the volunteer fire department.

In September of 1891, the Charles Floege Store and home on the Main Plaza caught fire. The building was a total loss because of the combustible material in the building, however, the firemen were able to save the adjoining structures. At the same time, the ringing of the bell called the fire fighters to a small fire across the Plaza at the Guadalupe Hotel (later Plaza) and then a third fire at the fire house next to the courthouse. These small fires were put out quickly. History tells us that the New Braunfels citizens became aware that additional equipment was needed. Gradually more hose companies were organized in the following years.

Until 1912, the fire department depended on hand-drawn hose reel and hook and latter carts. The volunteers were harnessed and provided foot-power to pull the equipment to the fires. Then Harry Landa offered a burned-out chassis of his Locomobile to the department. They converted it into a motorized truck that was used until 1925. Never heard of a Locomobile? Every car manufacturer produced one. It was a self-propelled automobile with some even utilizing steam power. The Landa Locomobile used was a converted touring car.

When the first fire engine was purchased in 1913, the newspaper ran an article with rules for all citizens to observe. First, they were warned that the fire truck should not be considered a toy. The public should know that the engine will travel less than the 25 miles per hour, the speed limit for other vehicles. When hearing the engine, citizens are to turn to the right and give the fire engine the middle of the road. This applies to people walking, on horseback, in wagons or automobiles. They are told not to follow the engine.

These rules, in 2016, still apply. Don’t you pull over when you hear the siren on the fire truck?

Later, after the telephone was in use, the public was informed that there were 63 fire districts and each person should know his district number. In case of fire in their district, pick up the telephone, answer to “number please” on the part of the telephone operator, and say the word “central.” Then give the fire district number. Then hold the receiver to your ear while the alarm is transmitted to the fire bell, and be connected with the fire station. I believe I would have to write down all these instructions.

Where did the water come from to put out the fires? Darren Brinkkoeter, New Braunfels Batallion Chief and historian, said that the three companies each had a hose cart. The carts were positioned in three areas of the city in sheds. The fire department relied on wooden water mains buried under the streets. Firemen would have to dig a hole in the street, then bore a hole into the wooden water main. The hole in the street would fill up with water and could be pumped through the hoses. Leather buckets were also used to get the water and after the fire, the hole was plugged up in the pipe and street. Think about this in relation to time. The bell rings, the firemen run to the equipment where they are hooked up, they run to where the fire is, they drill a hole in the wooden pipe under the street, they pump the water from the hole to put out the fire. By this time, the fire must be a roaring blaze. When the fire is out, the hole is plugged and the running begins again to take the equipment back to where it belongs. This was no easy task and the firemen were looked up to as super athletes. You can see why.

The fire museum that Brinkkoeter is in charge of, has an old fire extinguisher. “When the heating unit behind the glass bottle reached a certain temperature, the bottle, filled with carbon tetrachloride, would spew and put out the fire. The museum has a fantastic collection of old engines, including the 1923 American LaFrance pumper truck designed for the firefighters to ride on the outside of the truck. Four original engines are in the museum, including the 1925 REO Hose Wagon (REO stands for Reginald E. Olds), that was the first move from horse-drawn or man-drawn hose carts to motorized hose transport. The old trucks have been a part of every parade in the city.

Early on in 1886, a Volunteer Firemen’s Band was formed that also participated in parades. I can remember when the firemen would stop at the Plaza during the Comal County Fair parade and have competitions. They would shoot the water up in the air, giving everyone on the Plaza a welcome shower. This was, of course, long after wooden water pipes had to be drilled and when hydrants were installed.

Up until 1918, there was no actual fire station and the first station built now houses the museum. It is located at 131 Hill Avenue and almost 100-years-old.

There are six fire stations in New Braunfels and on September 1, 2016 due to its excellent record, the Insurance Service Office changed the city’s Class 2 rating to a Class 1 rating, the highest level to achieve. These levels control how much insurance premium we pay in our city. Thank you, New Braunfels Fire Department.

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Once upon a time there were two large Victorian houses sitting side by side on Seguin Ave. next to the First Protestant Church. These two houses belonged to Joseph Faust and his son Walter Faust. Walter Faust’s house was right next to the church and it still stands there. Joseph Faust’s house was right next to Walter’s. That house no longer exists. Well, that’s not exactly true because it was sold and moved a little way down the street. It seems impossible that the large house could be moved, but it was.

Before we get to that almost impossible story, let’s look at the history of hotels in New Braunfels. Hotels, earlier called inns have been popular forever. A traveler getting a good night’s sleep, food, drink and good fellowship was essential to a mobile population. The first inn known in New Braunfels was that of Count Henkel von Donnersmark located across the street from the present McAdoos Restaurant. Von Donnersmark catered to those immigrants newly arrived who had money to spend and still nowhere to stay. Supposedly this inn did a big liquor business. It even became the post office.

Soon to follow were inns on the Main Plaza such as the Millett Hotel on the property where the courthouse is located. Also the Guadalupe Hotel which still stands. The Guadalupe became the Schmitz Hotel in 1855. This was the most well-known hotel because it was also the stopping place of the pony express.

Down East San Antonio St. was the Comal Hotel or Eggeling Hotel built in 1899 (Prince Solms Inn). By the time trains came to NB, passengers were picked up at the train station and taken to the hotel.

Now we get to the granddaddy of them all, the Faust Hotel. What prompted the building of this big downtown hotel was interest in attracting the early 1900s tourist. Paul Jahn with the Chamber of Commerce reported that a committee had been formed to promote the idea of a hotel. The New Braunfels Hotel Company Inc. organized and it was decided to form a stock company of local citizens.

At the first meeting of stockholders, Emil Fischer was elected president, Walter Faust, vice-president, and B.W. Nuhn, secretary-treasurer. An offer was made by the Joseph Faust Estate to place a hotel on the Joseph Faust property where his house was. It was moved off the lot and sold to the Drs. Frueholz. It is cattycornered to the church where it still stands. The story of that move can be found in the Sophienburg.com column on 11-30-2010. The Walter Faust house was eventually purchased by the First Protestant Church.

Although primarily an agricultural community, because of the rivers, New Braunfels was also tourist town. With the coming of the railroad, the town was becoming more well known. After a severe drought in the early 1920s, the community recovered and saw a need for hotels. Salesmen called drummers were flocking to town to sell their goods. They not only needed a room to stay in, but also a temporary room to set up their products. This practice was very important to the mercantile business. The New Braunfels Hotel Company would build a hotel called the Travelers Hotel.

My husband, Glyn, grew up living in the Goff Hotel in Kenedy and remembers the salesmen that stopped at the only hotel between San Antonio and Corpus Christi. The 65 room hotel was owned by his grandparents, P.R. and Ida Goff. Stories about this hotel are very similar to the stories of the Faust and they were both built about the same time.

Bids for the four-story Travelers Hotel were requested and the total was to be $120,000 for the building only. Architect was Harvey P. Smith of San Antonio and contractor was Walter Sippel.

After completion in 1929, the hotel was leased to Nagel & Wuest of San Antonio for 15 years. About the time of opening, Nagel & Wuest who agreed to pay for some of the furnishings could not pay for what they had agreed. Since several conventions were already scheduled, First National Bank of New Braunfels agreed to pay the suppliers until they would be reimbursed. That never happened. A grand opening celebration was held Oct. 12, 1929 in spite of the trouble. It was quite an affair with over 2,000 people attending. Who didn’t show was the governor, Dan Moody, even after sending in his RSVP accepting.

A few years after opening, the hotel was turned back to the Hotel Company ending the contract with the Nagel and Wuest. They released the building with all bills pending. The Board turned down future lease offers because they wanted to sell the building.

Upon the death of Walter Faust, Hanno Faust was elected president of the company and he was given full power to operate the hotel in 1933. The hotel was renamed the Faust Hotel after the Faust family. Milton Dietz was the executor of the will of Walter Faust. In 1946, Dietz became president of the company and also became general manager of the Faust Hotel. In 1947, the hotel was purchased by local businessman Arlon Krueger who retained ownership until 1977. Hotel businesses everywhere were being replaced by motels that were more accessible and less expensive. By this time the grand old building was showing its age. The exterior had blackened, windows had broken, squirrels had moved in, and water had damaged the inside.

In 1977, Jackson and Houser purchased the building out of an interest in old hotels. They began the restoration process. Over time with several owners and several restorations, the once-beautiful hotel returned. Eight years ago, the hotel was sold to Vance and Priscilla Hinton.

The outdoor patio had been closed and now houses the Faust Brewing Co. while maintaining the 1920s atmosphere. Brewmaster Ray Mitteldorf who had extensive experience with several other breweries was hired to brew the beer. Making beer takes time and everything brewed in the Faust has to be sold there and can’t be sold at another outlet. This will be taken care of soon, as the Faust is opening the Faust Brewing Company on the corner of Butcher and Castell. Bottled beer and kegs will be manufactured and sold. An outdoor beergarten is planned to open in the future. The owners and brewmaster knew that something had to be done to manufacture more of their popular beer.

The historic Faust Hotel with its brewery and “brew-pub” food with a “German flair” will continue to be open to the public and “what’s old is new and what’s new is old,” so the saying goes. Look for details of the opening of their additional location.

The Faust Hotel is on the National Register of Historic Places, is a Recorded Texas Historic Landmark, and is a New Braunfels Historic Landmark.

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