When the Faust St. Bridge received the prestigious Texas Historic Civil Engineering Landmark Award recently, all attention was on the bridge itself. But the Faust St. Bridge was more to New Braunfels than that; it was the way that hundreds of NB citizens got to the textile mill.

The bridge was the first high-water bridge in Comal County. On April 5, 1887, when the County took bids for the bridge, it was not in the city limits. The King Iron Bridge Mfg. Co. of Cleveland, Ohio, got the contract and the total cost including land for right-of-way and engineering costs was $33,269.The bridge built along the Camino Real provided an access across the Guadalupe on State Hwy. 2 from San Antonio to Austin. (Source: Comal County minutes and Oscar Haas)

In 1921 the trustees of Planters and Merchants Mill of San Antonio bought the land on the other side of the Guadalupe River located in the Esnaurizar Eleven League Grant from Louis and Bertha Meyer. A charter was granted two years later for the construction of a mill. The trustees built the local textile mill for the manufacture of fine cotton ginghams. Eventually the Planters and Merchants Mill became the New Braunfels Textile Mill, then the Mission Valley Mills s and then the West Point Pepperell.

The interest in textile mills flourished after WWI when materials became more plentiful. During the war, all textiles were devoted to the war effort. Major S.M. Ransopher set up the mill and brought with him R. B. Vickers and Howard McKenna with experience from textile mills in New England to help him run the mill. Both Vickers and McKenna became lifetime citizens of NB.

In 1929 Planters and Merchants declared bankruptcy and closed for about a month. In receivership, it was operated by Col. Ralph Durkee. The mill reorganized in August of 1931 under the name of New Braunfels Textile Mills. The William Iselin Co. of New York plus local citizens purchased stock in the plant. One of the new directors, Harry Wagenfuehr, sold stock locally. Reopening the mill was a real boost to New Braunfels.

In 1977 Herb Skoog from Radio Station KGNB-KNBT and the Sophienburg Reflections programs interviewed well-known business man in town, Haney Elliott Knox, about the history of the textile mill. Most of you know that Elliott Knox Blvd., which used to be Hwy. 81, was named after him. Active politically, Knox was elected mayor of NB in 1967. He and McKenna both served as chairmen of the McKenna Memorial Hospital.

H.E. Knox came to New Braunfels right after graduating from Texas Tech University in 1935 with a degree in textile chemistry. Knox said the primary reason for Tech’s offering this degree was the large cotton and wool crops in Texas at the time. Walter Dillard was running the mill and Howard McKenna was plant superintendent. Knox began as a laborer in the dye house at $12 a week.

In those early ’30s, patterns of the materials were determined by artists or customers. Styles changed rapidly and there was always a spring and fall line. There were about 300 employees. Over the life of the mill, thousands of families had textile mill connections.

After WWII the mill was expanded. They even started a retail operation about 1946. Bluebonnet Ginghams was the trade name and principal product. The operation moved into the Dacron business about 1955. Polyester, nylon and cotton blend changed the original product to a blend. Another change was Sanforizing ,the mechanical process of shrinking goods, thereby getting rid of the pre-wash of the past.

Big customers were Montgomery Ward, Sears, and J.C. Penney. In 1932 H. Dittlinger Roller Mills began sacking their flour in Bluebonnet Gingham. The sacks were in many colors that could be made into all sorts of articles of clothing. Because of the high quality of the cotton, these pieces of clothing made good “hand-me-downs”.

The bridge and the mill are a history lesson in themselves. From the center of the Faust St. Bridge, look up river and see the dam leading to the mill. Above the dam, submerged by the higher water was the settlers’ crossing at the foot of Nacogdoches St. The dam changed the Guadalupe forever.

Google Maps: Faust Street Bridge

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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 prime real estate was first drawn by lot from the Adelsverein’s land grant by Aloys Rosser in 1848. Rosser sold it to Jacob Winkler in 1850, who quickly flipped it to H. Bevenroth. By 1854, Bevenroth’s estate had sold Lot 89 to Charles Rossy and his wife, and they sold it to Carl Floege. Six owners in six years — I’m guessing that maybe they wanted farmland not city property or perhaps saw a quick way to make some cash.

Carl Floege, a cabinetmaker by trade, immigrated to Texas in 1849. After obtaining Lot 89 in 1854, he built a home and his first general store on the property. He built a much larger, two-story business on Main Plaza (location of Utilities building) and a larger home off Market Plaza. Impressive! More impressive, he used his carpentry skills and know-how to build the first low-water bridge over the Comal at West San Antonio Street (1856), the Torrey Mill bridge on the Comal at Bridge Street (1867) and a new high-water bridge over the Comal (1873) at the location of his former low-water bridge after it had washed away.

Mr. Floege also used his trade to work on the first Comal County Courthouse (1856), a new 66-foot river ferryboat (1859), add rooms to the New Braunfels Academy (1867), deal with city streets and drainage issues (1873-1874), and build numerous stores and homes. Carl could truthfully say he built a lot of old New Braunfels with his two hands.

Carl Floege sold Lot 89 to Rudolph DuMenil in 1858, after the completion of his larger store and home. DuMenil had emigrated from Germany in 1850, and first lived in Hortontown where he ran a meat market for about eight years. In 1858, he moved into the old Floege home and set up his own general merchandising business in the old Floege Store. DuMenil literally sold everything but the kitchen sink — Hungarian grass, bois d’arc saplings for living fence lines, whiskey and brandy, clothing, dry goods, lead and percussion caps, hardware, tobacco products, paint, stoves and kitchenware. Maybe he did sell the sink! Rudolph also sold an ambulance, pianos and did freighting as well as being involved in local education as a trustee at the New Braunfels Academy.

In 1875, DuMenil auctioned off his store inventory and rented the store building to Carl Floege’s son Herman to use as a wagon business. When Herman Floege moved his business elsewhere in 1881, the store was rented to Homans Saddlery/Leather shop.

Lot 89, with the old Floege home and store, was sold by the DuMenils to Cuno “C.J.” Ludewig in 1902. Mr. Ludewig and his brothers had started a furniture business in 1887 at the location of the old Krueger Chevrolet building (across from Granzin Bar-B-Q). C. J. Ludewig took over the business from his brothers and moved it to the Seguin Street property in 1905. The family lived in the old home and ran the furniture company out of the DuMenil store. In 1929, a new “modern” brick building was built next to the old DuMenil store. It had the first elevator in any building in New Braunfels. Almost 3,500 townspeople attended the new store opening event where souvenir ashtrays featuring Charles Lindbergh’s face were distributed. The building was just one of several “modern” buildings built just prior to the market crash of 1929: Travelers Hotel (Faust) 1927, Comal Power Plant (Landmark) 1926, Greyhound Bus Station (Celebrations) 1929, Booker T. Washington School 1929, and the old City Hall 1929, to name a few.

All three of Ludewig’s sons helped in the store. Local competitors included Jahn Furniture Co., Lack’s Furniture & Automotive, and Starke’s Furniture in Seguin. Ludewig’s sold all kinds of high-quality manufactured furniture that included kitchen, living and bedroom pieces. To promote their company, C.J.’s son, Monroe F. “Fatty” Ludewig, began giving out “little Lane cedar chests” to graduating senior girls in New Braunfels. I still have mine!

When the Ludewig fam­ily de­cided to get out of the busi­ness, they leased the 1929 fur­ni­ture build­ing and the old Du­Me­nil store to Wal­lace and Dorothy John­son in 1966, who con­tin­ued to run the busi­ness un­der the name John­son Fur­ni­ture Co. In 1972, the John­sons bought the prop­erty out­right. In 1984, the old Du­Me­nil Store was sold and moved to Gruene (Hunter Junc­tion) where it sur­vives.

Wal­lace and Dorothy’s daugh­ter Carol pur­chased the prop­erty from her par­ents in 1989 and runs the John­son Fur­ni­ture store to­day. She con­tin­ues the legacy of pro­vid­ing qual­ity fur­ni­ture and decor to New Braun­fels cit­i­zens that be­gan on Lot 89 over 120 years ago.

If you have never been in­side this his­toric fam­ily busi­ness, you have a chance to prac­tice yoga in it on Thurs­day, Oc­to­ber 10, 2024, from 5:30–7 p.m. The $15 fee ben­e­fits the So­phien­burg Mu­seum & Archives. Fol­low­ing prac­tice, a bev­er­age and his­tory talk will let you ex­plore the build­ing.

If you are not into yoga, drop by the store, say hello and check out all the good stuff. Carol’s got a chair, bed or table that is bound to have your name on it.

Sources: Sophienburg Museum & Archives: Ludewig, Floege and DuMenil family histories; Reflections program #918-Monroe C. Ludewig; New Braunfels Herald and Neu Braunfelser Herald newspaper collections.

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

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By Myra Lee Adams Goff —

What story could be timelier than a story about bridges? The San Antonio Street Bridge, the main bridge across the Comal River linking New Braunfels to Comaltown, is undergoing massive renovations that will take almost two years to complete. Under the circumstances, detours have been worked out and the traffic patterns will change. The Garden Street Bridge is one of the detours taking over the job of the San Antonio Street Bridge during this time.

Before the building of bridges, do you wonder how in 1845, people managed to cross from New Braunfels to Comaltown and back? The answer is that before the building of Clemens Dam, the water was shallower and there were several low-water crossings. Small islands on the Comal River, long disappeared, allowed people to just walk across.

The first bridge crossing between the two communities of New Braunfels and Comaltown was made of two pecan trees. It was appropriately called Pecan Bridge. According to early historian Hermann Seele, there was a foot bridge where the present Bridge Street meets the Comal. Seele tells us that there was a small island in the water where the Comal Creek and the Comal River merged above Clemens Dam. Early maps show where this little island was located. Two large pecan trees had been felled on to the island from the banks and this was the Brücken (bridge) that connected New Braunfels with Comaltown. In Oscar Haas’ translation of one of Fritz Goldbeck’s poem, Goldbeck says that often he and his brother crossed this bridge at the break of day to shoot wild turkey-cocks that came nightly to roost in the pecan forest on the opposite bank of the Comal (Comaltown). Pedestrians crossed back and forth from New Braunfels to Comaltown by holding on to handrails. History tells us that pecan and elm trees made up much of the forests of Comaltown.

The first bridge to accommodate wagons was built by the city in 1856. This bridge, made of timber, was located diagonally from the foot of Mill Street to the north edge of San Antonio Street. After ten years another bridge was built there in 1866 but was partially destroyed by the flood of 1869. This bridge was consequently repaired only to be completely torn away by another flood in 1870. The city then built an iron bridge in the same spot; it was also washed away by flood in 1872. This whole saga seems almost unbelievable.

Merchant C.C. Floege built a low-water crossing in 1872 that lasted until 1894 when it was replaced by a high-water bridge built from scrap metal salvaged from the Chicago World’s Fair. Then in 1923, the present concrete bridge was built. It has been used since that time and is the one being reconstructed now (2019). Wouldn’t you say that it has served New Braunfels well?

When you are standing in the middle of the concrete bridge, look over to the left towards the Tube Chute. That’s where John Torrey’s mill was located. John Torrey was a prominent figure in early New Braunfels. He owned a great deal of land in Comaltown and donated the land for the Comal Cemetery. Torrey Street and Torrey Park are named after him.

Torrey was a true industrialist. He entered into a lease agreement in 1848 with Hermann Spiess, trustee of the German Emigrant Co., to build a mill. Understanding the power of water, he built a dam in order to use water power to run his mill. He built a saw and grist mill and later added facilities for the manufacture of wheat flour and a shop for making doors, sashes and blinds. The top story of the mill was destroyed by fire in 1861. Torrey then added a three-story stone building. In 1872 a cloudburst caused a flood, tearing the foundation and destroying the rebuilt dam. You can still see remnants of the foundation at the Clemens Dam. lt has been said that fire, wind, and water plotted against John Torrey’s efforts on the Comal River. That three-and-a-half-mile river just wouldn’t give up.

John Torrey finally did give up his battle with the river and sold his property to banker William Clemens. In those days, owning property on the river meant that you also owned the water. Clemens built the dam in 1882 out of stone that was from the same quarry used to build the Comal County Courthouse. The dam stood idle until 1886, when Clemens secured a contract with the City of NB to furnish water for the first waterworks. This arrangement continued until the city purchased their own waterworks at the head of the Comal Springs at The Headwaters. Clemens Dam became idle with much of its upper structure removed. During World War II, as much scrap metal as possible was removed for use in the war effort. Who would have dreamed that this old dam could become the Tube Chute — one of the top tourist attractions in Texas?

The necessary renovations of the San Antonio Street Bridge forces the city to keep it closed until it once again becomes usable. Detours are necessary. One of the main detours is over the concrete Garden Street Bridge. The Garden Street Bridge was built in 1931. If you are not familiar with it now, you will be because it is a main detour route over the Comal River while construction is happening. The Garden Street Bridge was designed by architect Jeremiah Schmidt, a well-known designer of structures in New Braunfels. My grandfather, A.C. Moeller, was the contractor for the construction of this bridge. He and the other Moeller brothers were definitely involved in the building of some very important bridges and buildings in New Braunfels and Comaltown. Next time I will be telling you about the Moeller brothers and their legacy in New Braunfels.

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