In 1867 when cotton was “king”, Andrew Jackson Hunter bought a tract of land in eastern Comal County for the purpose of raising cotton. He lived nearby on York Creek. In 1880 when the IGN Railroad came through that area, the small settlement was called Hunter. As you drive out past Gruene, you’re on Hunter Road and one of the oldest businesses in Hunter is Riley’s Tavern.

There were about 60 people in the settlement of Hunter when its namesake lived there. Businesses sprang up. About 10 years after the railroad came through, Gustavus A. Schleyer opened a general store, post office and saloon. There was a blacksmith, a church, a barbershop, meat market and school. The population soon grew to 200.

Andrew Jackson Hunter died in 1883 and his acreage and holdings were divided among his children. In 1894 Hunter’s daughter and son-in-law, Edward M. House, organized the Hunter Cotton Gin Co. and went into business with Harry Landa of New Braunfels. Six mule wagon teams hauled cottonseed from the Hunter Gin to the Landa Cotton Oil Mill on Landa Street. Eventually Landa bought out House’s interest in the gin and the House connection to the community of Hunter was no more.

Let’s look more into the background of Edward Mandel House. His father, Thomas William House, was a wealthy landowner from Houston who also owned sugar plantations and was eventually mayor of Houston.

As a young man, Edward House went to boarding school and was always interested in politics. He entered Cornell University and stayed there until his father became ill. He went home to Houston to take care of him. When his father died, House married Louise Hunter of Hunter, Texas. The couple honeymooned in Europe and then returned to Houston to supervise the extensive landholdings of the family.

In 1885 the couple moved to Austin to be nearer the cotton plantations. In Austin, House entered the political scene and helped several governors achieve the governorship. He wintered in New York and gradually moved to the east permanently. He became involved in national politics by participating in the presidential campaigns of Woodrow Wilson and later Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Hunter died in 1938. (Source: Handbook of Texas Online, Charles E. Neu)

But let’s get back to the small town of Hunter. When another railroad, the MKT, built a line through the area in 1901, the populations was still about 200. When the cotton industry declined, businesses began closing. By 1947 both railroad depots closed. The little one-room school was consolidated with the NBISD and the final blow was the closing of the post office in 1953.

Riley’s Tavern was alternately a house and tavern. It was at one time Galloway Saloon, and then the home of the Bernardino Sanchez family. Along the way, the house and tavern was rented to the Riley family and then finally sold to James Curtis Riley in 1942.

A tavern or saloon is a “beer joint” and Prohibition dealt it a mighty blow. In 1933 when prohibition ended, 17 year old J.C. Riley drove to Austin with his uncle in a Model T to get a permit for a liquor license. They arrived early and waited on the steps of the capitol for the doors to open. They were the very first in Texas to get a permit to get a liquor license.

Some of you may remember that Hays County was a “dry” county and all up and down the county line between Hays and “wet” Comal County were saloons. Riley’s Tavern was active. Once Hays voted “wet” in 1977, business was not as active.

When Riley died in 1991, his wife sold the saloon to Rick and Donna Wilson. Eleven years ago Riley’s Tavern was purchased by long-time Hays County resident, Joel Hofmann. His clientele are sometimes third generation customers. The tavern is open seven days a week and boasts a band every night.

Hofmann is working towards an application for a Texas Historical Commission marker for Hunter and Riley’s Tavern. Cotton is gone, the cotton gin is no more, the school is gone, the depots are gone, but Riley’s Tavern lives on. York Creek trickles along through Hunter.

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By Tara V. Kohlenberg

Change. One of the few constants of life. Because change is occurring rapidly in and around New Braunfels, rural cemeteries are endangered. Cemeteries and graveyards are sometimes the only connection to the history of an area. York Creek Cemetery is one of historical importance, as it documents the lives of early permanent inhabitants of the York Creek and Hunter communities.

Where the heck is York Creek, you might ask? The actual York Creek begins somewhere around Wegner Road in Comal County and travels southeast through Hays and Guadalupe counties before flowing into the San Marcos River. The creek naturally attracted farmers to the resource.

Along about 1867, a man by the name of Andrew Jackson Hunter settled his family on York’s Creek (now York Creek). He operated a thousand-acre cotton farm. The land was strategically located along a stagecoach line that ran from New Braunfels to San Marcos before the railroad.

In 1880, the townsite of Hunter was established with the arrival of the International and Great Northern Railroad. By 1883 a post office opened in Gustavus A. Schleyer’s general store, with the owner as postmaster. Schleyer’s store, a cotton gin, a grocery store, and a saloon were in operation there by 1884, when Hunter had about sixty residents. By 1890, Hunter was a bustling community of 200 that included two saloons, a barbershop, a blacksmith, a wagonmaker, a meat market, and a gin and gristmill.

York’s Creek Cemetery came into being on October 7, 1882, when Ernst Gruene, Jr. sold one acre of land to D. G. Posey, Frank Tate, and Charles Crawford to be used as a community cemetery. Posey, Tate and Crawford were the first cemetery trustees. The cemetery doubled in size in 1904, when William Simon, Sr. sold one acre of land to cemetery trustees, D. G. Posey, Charles Crawford, and William Simon, Jr. That is when they formed an association and officially named it York Creek Cemetery. They elected D. G. Posey, C. B. Crawford, and H. Wiegreffe as commissioners. A. J. Wallhoefer was elected secretary and treasurer. Currently, Mr. James B. Skarovsky and his wife, Lynn, are the only trustees of record.

There are over 180 burials recorded in York Creek Cemetery. According to existing records the earliest burial in the newly established cemetery was John B. Taylor, in 1885. Seven of the graves must have been moved to York Creek, as the death dates predate the cemetery. Most of those buried in the cemetery were born in Texas although at least 16 were born in Germany. Over half of those buried bear German surnames. Occupations of the deceased and their families included farmers, homemakers, laborers, railroad workers, blacksmiths, military, and saloon keepers. Hobart Gilmore, who was killed in 1972 Flood, is also buried there.

Walking through the cemetery, it is easy to see the various family groupings with over 68 different surnames (no way to write about all of them!). Some families are represented in greater numbers. The Soechtings have twenty-one graves. Friedrich Heinrich Andreas Söchting (German spelling) immigrated to Texas in 1852. While preparing to emigrate, he met Christine Katarina Gold, also planning to emigrate. Since married couples received special consideration, they married, before leaving Germany. They moved inland to New Braunfels and in 1866 they purchased 17.5 acres on York Creek. In 1878, they purchased an additional 338 acres for 4.90 an acre. They raised five children.. The children in turn had large families and most continued to farm in the area.

In 1850, Henry Rutherford Crawford and wife, Ann B. Wilson Crawford moved from Tennessee and purchased a 300-acre farm on Hunter Road. The couple established a school in the nearby Bonito settlement. Prior to that time, the first school was conducted in their home with their daughter, Lizzie Crawford, as teacher. Lizzie also taught at the Hunter School. In her will, she designated 500 to build the cemetery fence. Her brother, Charles B. Crawford was one of the first cemetery trustees.

Frances D’Gress Posey came to Texas at age 5 in a wagon train with his parents, brothers and aunts from Tennessee. The Posey family arrived in Texas at the Watson Campgrounds in Comal County (or could be Hays County) in early fall of 1853. That was their home for several years. Eventually, his parents, John Bennett and Amanda Posey, farmed cotton on 539 acres in the York Creek area. Frances D’Gress Posey married Mary Elizabeth Neill in 1869. Frances was a farmer and one of the first cemetery association trustees. He, his wife and many descendants are buried in the York Creek Cemetery. Posey land is now part of TXI.

John Dix Watson conveyed one acre of land in exchange for 1 for the nearby Watson School. It was located on Neill homestead land off Watson Lane. The school was closed in 1949 and combined with other schools as the Goodwin School. Mr. Watson was a Confederate veteran. He is one of seven veterans buried in York Creek

James Curtis Riley was a saloon keeper and started Riley’s Tavern in Hunter after the repeal of Prohibition. Riley’s Tavern has a Texas Historical Commission marker and is listed in the National Register of Historic Places. It is one of the oldest taverns in Texas and reported to have the first liquor license issued after the repeal.

Alwin Merz was a trustee when the cemetery was established. He was a farmer married to Annie Braune Merz. Alwin’s parents were John and Elise Strempel Merz, who immigrated from Germany and farmed the York Creek area. Both couples are buried in the York Creek Cemetery.

York Creek Cemetery is a perfect example of a rural cemetery: quietly resting under huge oak trees, protected by a chain link fence with rock posts. Unfortunately, the two-acre cemetery is no longer located among the green pastures and farmhouses. The York Creek/Hunter community was sheared in half when Interstate 35 was built; and the cemetery is now surrounded by industrial warehouses just off one of the most travelled highways in Texas. Little has changed inside the York Creek Cemetery, but much has changed around this true Comal County treasure that holds so much history. It was designated a Historic Texas Cemetery by the Comal County Historical Commission 2022.

Sources: Handbook of Texas Online; The Comal County Historical Commission; Jim Skarovsky; Paul Soechting; Wilfred Schlather; John Coers; Karen Boyd.

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By Keva Hoffmann Boardman –

I discovered something interesting the other day. In a 1954 New Braunfels Herald column called, “The Melting Pot,” the writer, Gordon Rose, discusses the names of nearby localities known by both German/Anglo and Mexican citizens. The names these two cultures chose give us insight to how people thought about things. Let me give you some examples.

The community of Zorn, on Hwy 123, was established by Joseph Zorn when he built the first store in the area in the 1850s. In 1903, Fritz Galle drilled a well next to York Creek and found water containing high concentrates of sulfur and other minerals. The Mexican community began calling Zorn “Asufrosa” (Sulfur) and would visit the town’s sulfur well to bathe and drink in the healing water; they would also bring buckets to fill and take home.

Barbarossa, a small town on FM 758, was settled in the 1860s by German immigrants who named their community in honor of Holy Roman Emperor Frederick Barbarossa. (It has always sounded like the name of a pirate to me.) Spanish-speaking old-timers called the settlement “El Salon Quemado” (The Burned Room/Hall) after the local dance hall burned down.

Solms, just down IH-35, was originally known as Four-Mile Creek when it was settled in the late 1840s. The settlement was renamed Solms in the 1880s to honor Prince Carl of Solms-Braunfels. To local Mexicans, the area was known as “Los Olmos” (The Elms).

Four miles southwest of NB, Dittlinger is located on the Union Pacific (IG &N) Railroad. It was organized in 1907 by H. Dittlinger as a company town for his rock crushing plant and lime kiln and included houses, store and school. The Hispanic American families that made Dittlinger their home called it “La Calera” (The Lime Kiln).

The small community of Hortontown was across the Guadalupe River from NB. It was settled in 1847 when Leopold Iwonsky sold fifty-acre tracts from the Albert C. Horton survey. In 1850, Jacob de Cordova provided a lot for St. Martin’s Evangelical Lutheran Church to build a structure. The church tower was topped with a “wetterhahne” or a weathervane that included a rooster. The area’s Spanish speakers began referring to the neighborhood as “El Gallo” or” El Gallito” (The Rooster or Little Rooster) in reference to the weathercock.

The neighborhood near the S. Seguin Street overpass got the English nickname of “Frogtown” soon after the construction of the railroad track. The track’s elevation caused serious drainage issues and the flooded areas attracted myriads of croaking frogs until the impromptu ponds evaporated. Local Mexican citizens called the neighborhood “Canta Ranas” (Singing Frogs).

The neighborhood at the end of W. San Antonio Street past Live Oak is known as “The West End.” The neighborhood, predominantly settled by Hispanic families from the very early days of New Braunfels, was one of the last downtown areas to have access to city water and sewage. Its inhabitants aptly called it “Barrrio Seco” (Dry Neighborhood). Many continue to call it that today.

Back behind Sts. Peter and Paul Catholic Church runs Zink Street, so named because Nicholas Zink set up his survey equipment in 1845 and platted the town of New Braunfels from there. A group of small tin-roofed houses sat along part of the street, which its Hispanic occupants called “La Hojahata” (Tin). The appellation could have described most of New Braunfels which was known as “The Tin City” because its fire codes required tin roofs on all structures.

Hunter is a small community up Hunter Road on York’s Creek (think Riley’s Tavern). It was named for Andrew Jackson Hunter who, in 1867, settled and operated a thousand-acre cotton farm in the area. The town was established in 1880 when tracks were laid by the IG&N Railroad. By 1883, Gustav Schleyer had set up a post office and general store which were joined by a cotton gin, a grocery and a saloon by the next year. As the town grew, more saloons, a blacksmith, a barbershop, a wagon maker, a gristmill and a meat market were added. Hunter’s son-in-law, Edward M. House, and Harry Landa formed a partnership that bought up nearby land, set up the Hunter Cotton Gin Co. and used mule teams to haul cottonseed to Landa Cotton Oil Mill (think the Wurstfest buildings). A large influx of Mexican immigrants began settling in the community and a school and St. John’s Catholic Church reflected that impact. They called the community “La Mota” (The Speck or Weed).

As cotton growing declined with the arrival of the boll weevil, these Mexicans found themselves out of work. An enterprising group, led by town carpenter Pablo de la Rosa, began new businesses which capitalized on the auto traffic going through Hunter/La Mota on its way to San Antonio and Austin. In 1921, Pablo went to San Antonio and learned how to make plaster of Paris casts of animals. He opened the first plaster art shop in the town selling colorful bulldogs and flower bouquets as doorstops and bookends. His bulldogs didn’t have closed jaws but wore a snarl and stuck out red tongues. Pablo de la Rosa also created his own plaster casts of the Virgin de Guadalupe and busts of Hidalgo.

The town barber, Bernardino Sanchez, followed Pablo’s lead and also went to San Antonio to learn how to make plaster casts which included horses and cows, which he painted with spots. Eventually he owned four shops in downtown La Mota – buying nine lots along the road. Soon other families engaged in the creation of plaster dogs, cows, birds, chickens, flower bouquets and the like, all highly painted in bright colors. The plaster art reflected the seasons: longhorns with UT on their foreheads, deer during hunting season, rabbits and lambs during Easter. Cars passing through Hunter whizzed by rows and rows of wooden tables and benches loaded with the painted plaster animals which sold for eight cents to three dollars each. Business was great and Mr. Sanchez was able to pay cash for a brand new 1928 Model A Ford.

My dad remembers going through Hunter as a child. It was a magical drive with what seemed like countless enticing creatures lining the road. His family purchased a life-size bulldog that they used as a doorstop. As we talked, he wondered what had happened to that dog. I wonder too.

Anyone remember Hunter’s plaster animals or still have an example of this unique art?

Do any of you know interesting dual place names of other locales in Comal County? Let me know!

Sources: New Braunfels Herald and Neu Braunfels Zeitung collections; SA Express News Aug 5, 1928; “Reflections” oral history, #81 Albert Hoffman; and vertical files, Sophienburg Museum & Archives; Around the Sophienburg, Myra Lee Adams Goff, pp248-249; Phone interview with Paul O. Sanchez; https://www.co.comal.tx.us/CCHC.htm; http://www.texasescapes.com; https://www.tshaonline.org.

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The Greater New Braunfels Chamber of Commerce sponsors an amazing brochure titled “New Braunfels, Texas Culture & Heritage (Kultur und Erbe).” The brochure invites you to take a peek inside with the words “Open to see trails & explorations involving New Braunfels, Texas.” Just inside the front cover, one can find out that there were many expeditions that went through New Braunfels in the 1600s and 1700s; many old transportation trails including the Old Indianola Trail, San Antonio Stage Line, El Camino Real de los Tejas National Historic Trail (also known as the King’s Highway), International & Great Northern Railroad, and the Meridian Highway; some military and postal routes; and some cattle trails and Indian Nation trails including the Shawnee, Chisholm and the Western. Obviously, all of these trails led to an abundance of trade and social interaction and we have been right in the middle of all of it. Of course, new trails (roads and highways) are being made every day.

What is a trail? Mostly it is a means of getting from one place to another. Even the smallest ant makes trails that the whole colony travels. I still remember the trails of the red ants that were more prevalent when I was a a child. They left the nest and one by one followed a path that led them to water or food. As kids, we even had a song that we sang as we watched this process: “The ants go marching one by one, hoorah, hoorah.” Out in the wilderness you can observe paths made by animals.

Indianola Trail

If we use this simple definition of a trail, then the trip from Germany to Galveston was a trail. Some old trails from the coast to New Braunfels are significant enough to be marked. Some have national and state significance as well. The trail from Indianola to New Braunfels is marked by granite markers. It marked the trek by the German immigrants first led by Prince Karl and the Adelsverein. They traveled from the coast on the east side of the Guadalupe River and then crossed into New Braunfels. Five sites along the route are marked. They include in order, Indianola, Victoria, Gonzales, Seguin and New Braunfels. The markers begin at the foot of the LeSalle statue at Indianola and end in a flower bed on the Castell Avenue side of the New Braunfels Civic Center. This trail memorializes the thousands of German immigrants that braved the elements to reach this destination.

El Camino Real

When the settlers reached the Guadalupe River on March 21, 1845, the settlers crossed the river at the El Camino Real or Old King’s Highway, an old established trail. The crossing site can be viewed from the Faust Street Bridge. El Camino Real de los Tejas (now a National Historic Trail) became part of the National Trails System in 2004. It is a corridor that encompasses 2,580 miles of trail from the Rio Grande near Eagle Pass and Laredo to Natchitoches, Louisiana. The period of historical significance dates from 1680 to1845. When Spanish explorers began to travel into Texas and western Louisiana in the 1680s, they followed already existing networks of American Indian trails.

Representatives of the Spanish Crown used these paths to reach areas where they subsequently established missions and presidios. In Comal County and New Braunfels there is a corridor of trail routes extending from the Old Bastrop Road and Hunter Road to the Comal Springs, along Nacogdoches Road to Hwy 482 and then crosses the Cibolo along the Old Nacogdoches Road. The Comal Springs were discovered in 1691 by Spanish Explorers. Many American Indian tribes were found living there at the time. In 1918, The Daughters of the American Revolution marked the El Camino Real with markers every five miles. There are five in Comal County and their locations can be found by reading this Sophienburg column from November 1, 2010.

The Chisholm Trail

The Chisholm Trail was not the longest cattle trail but probably became the most famous due to movies and the many versions of: “Come along boys and listen to my tale, I’ll tell you of my troubles on the Old Chisholm Trail. Come a ti yi yippee, come a ti yi, yea.” The longhorns moved slowly giving the cowhands plenty of time to make up different versions of this song. Supposedly over 1000 versions have been found. From the Chisholm Trail brochure sponsored by The Texas Historical Commission: “In the decades following the Civil War, more than six million cattle were herded out of Texas in one of the greatest migrations of animals ever known. The 19^th century cattle drives laid the foundation for Texas’ wildly successful cattle industry and helped elevate the state out of post-Civil War despair and poverty. Today, our search for an American identity consistently leads us back to the vision of the rugged and independent men and women of the cattle drive era.” The Chisholm Trail came through New Braunfels roughly following IH 35. The Chisholm Trail era ended in the 1880s and a new marker for this trail has been placed at the corner of Seguin Avenue and Nacogdoches Road. Soon, a second marker will be placed at the Comal County Courthouse.

Meridian Highway

Back on July 12, 2015, I wrote an article on the Meridian Highway in Texas (see Sophienburg.com) The following is an excerpt from that article describing the highway:

“When the Texas Highway Department was created in 1917, the Meridian Highway in Texas was called State Highway 2 which meant it was the second most important highway in Texas. The highway in Texas is approximately 900 miles. With the adoption of the interstate highway numbering system, this highway became US81 for the most part and much of the segments now follow IH 35, one of the nation’s busiest interstate highways. The highway links Canada to Mexico and also continues as the Pan-American Highway that stretches from Alaska to Argentina.” The Texas Historical Commission has completed a project to identify significant businesses along the Meridian Highway route. In New Braunfels, the following were identified: a gas station at 4731 Old Hwy 81; the Faust Street Bridge; the el Camino Real marker at Seguin and Nacogdoches; a gas station (now Palacio Tire Shop) at 711 S. Seguin Avenue; a gas station (part of Bluebonnet Motors) at 619 S. Seguin Avenue; Becker Motor Company (now Bluebonnet Motors) at 541 S. Seguin Avenue; a café and bus station (now Celebrations) at 275 S. Seguin Avenue; the Faust Hotel at 240 S. Seguin Avenue; the Prince Solms Inn at 295 E. San Antonio Street; Leissner Gas Station (now UPS) at 301 Main Plaza; the Schmitz Hotel at 471 Main Plaza; the Gerlich Auto Dealership at 386 W. San Antonio Street and an auto dealership and repair shop (now Landmark Properties and other businesses) at 472 and 474 W. San Antonio Street. For more information on the Meridian Highway, visit www.thc.texas.gov/meridian.

Trails in New Braunfels

Once you explore all of the trails leading to New Braunfels, you can download the New Braunfels mobile app found at http://walkingtourinnewbraunfels.com to embark on your self-guided walking tour of NB, driving tour of NB, walking tour of Gruene, or the NB murals tour. If you desire a professional guide for a unique walking tour, you can contact Jan Kingsbury at Spass Walking Tours of NB. Other tour guides can be found on the Chamber website also. What would the first founders of New Braunfels say if they could see what has become of the wilderness they explored. “Gee, it would have been easier if I had had the app on my phone.”

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