The third weekend in May I realized how hard it was to preserve historic customs. We can remodel, renovate and preserve buildings, bridges and artifacts. Even history is preserved when we write it down. But the arbitrary laws of custom are transient. In other words,” at random” customs are changeable.

Anhalt in the western area of Comal County has held on to old traditions with their Maifest and Octoberfest. Members of the Comal County Historical Commission went to Maifest and observed these old traditions first hand. The Anhalt Association is interested in getting an historical marker on their property. Preserving the history of Anhalt got a big boost when Harvey Schaefer in 2000 wrote the history using the minutes of the organization going back to when they were still written in German.

Comal County was created in 1846. The area of Anhalt in Comal County is typical of other hill country areas with rocky terrain covered with elm, mesquite, oak trees and abundant water. Farming is possible but ranching is preferable.

Way back in 1859 this area was known as Krause’s Settlement founded by Conrad Krause and sons with a store, residence and dancehall. A Post Office was established in 1879 and the settlement name changed to Anhalt, meaning “stopping place”, because that was what it was. Farmers gathered at the store to discuss their common problems, one of which was what to do about cattle rustlers that had become a big problem particularly after the Civil War. Since there was no fencing in the area, stock ran loose.

The solution to this problem was to form the Germania Farmer Verein in 1875. Thirty- five farmers met earlier at Krause’s store and decided to organize to protect their livestock by branding the letter “G” on the left shoulder of the cattle, along with the rancher’s own brand. This practice eliminated the cattle rustling problem. The all male organization leased and later purchased nearby land for their hall (across the highway from the original Krause’s Settlement). Over the years the organization built and added on to many sections of the building and in 1908 the large hall was built. It has a well-polished floor and unique arches in its architectural design.

The Spring Festival began as an annual event in May when planting was complete. Then a Fall Festival was held in October when harvesting was finished. Fairs were held to exhibit stock and vegetables, however, this practice ceased when the Comal County Fair organized in 1898.

Now let’s look at the customs that have been preserved:

The 2013 Maifest began at Anhalt Hall at noon. Food was served all day and the menu hasn’t changed much over the years. Due to a lack of refrigeration in the old days, nothing could be served that would spoil. Several men were making meat out back – potroast and sausage. Also sauerkraut and German potato salad which is served warm with no mayonnaise were served. There were two modern inventions served from cans – peas and peaches. In the old days food was served family style, but now by plate only.

Here is the real reason for the Maifest- the dance. Starting at noon the atmosphere is strictly German. An Oompah band plays German music until 4:00 o’clock at which time there is a Grand March. After that the music and crowd is strictly western. This is, after all, ranch land. Along the side of the wall western straw hats are for sale. At one time hats were not allowed on the dance floor.

Signs on the wall make it very clear as to what is acceptable on the dance floor and what is not. “No shorts, pedal pushers, blue jeans allowed on the dance floor”. That custom was obviously modified because there were many clad in blue jeans, shorts and boots.

Another sign posted says: “Indecent, uncommonly dancing in the hall is strictly prohibited.” Since there was none of the above taking place, I have a feeling they mean that one. Even the Chicken Dance and Put Your Little Foot were done with utmost precision.

Couples danced polkas and waltzes in a circle around the hall. Some danced holding babies and small children twirled around the outside of the moving circle. In the old days there was an area in the corner where children were bedded down. These dances, after all, lasted way into the night and it was a long way home.

Do you remember Gerhard and Regina Adam who married on our Plaza during our Sesquicentennial in 1995? He was representing Braunfels, our sister city. He and Regina came to Anhalt with Dr. Fred Frueholz. The Adams glided across the floor. He told me later that this old time polka and waltz was no longer done in Germany except occasionally in Bavaria. So Anhalt is preserving a custom brought from Germany that is no longer preserved in Germany.

A real treat was a performance in costume by the Austin International Folk Dancers. They performed several old dances like the Ländlar, Schottish.

A tee shirt for sale read “Wo in Himmel ist Anhalt? “ (Where in heaven (?) is Anhalt? I know where it is and I’ll be back the third Sunday in October for Octoberfest.

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Research for this year’s July 4th article led me on an unexpected journey into the past. My aim was to inform you, the reader, of the history of a certain piece of property at the Main Plaza, observable when you watch the Sophienburg’s annual parade and Independence celebration. That property is the present UPS store that looks amazingly like a filling station. That’s because it was. Before that, it was a mercantile store, a tavern, a residence,   and a fruit stand.

Here’s the history of that piece of property: In 1847 a small wooden building was leased to John Torrey in the exact location of that UPS building. The provision was that he would not open a saloon or a boarding house, and it became a mercantile store. John Torrey, along with his brothers owned a trading post near Houston on the Brazos River and he was the one that provided the provisions for the emigrants to New Braunfels from the coast. Guns and swords were sold to Prince Carl for his Mounted Company. Consequently, John Torrey accompanied the settlers to New Braunfels. He stayed here, engaged in many merchandise and industrial businesses and after industries on the Comal were destroyed by flood and once by fire, he left the town forever.

Now here’s where I got off the track. Seeking information about the Torrey Brothers’ Trading Co.  near Houston, I ran across Dr. Ferdinand Roemer’s story in 1846 about his trip to the trading co. He describes the topography of that particular area of Texas as much like the region between Austin and New Braunfels. Instead of dense forests, there were prairies covered with mesquite trees and occasional oak groves. One evening, he and his companion observed a prairie fire which they thought the Indians had started in order to drive the game in a certain direction for hunting and to burn off dry grass.

The next morning the trading post appeared before them with seven rough unhewn log houses. The largest house contained pelts received in trade from the Indians, most of which were buffalo robes, buffalo rugs, and deer hides. Some of the buffalo hides were painted artistically, which determined their value. Some were sold in Houston and most shipped to the Northern States and Canada. Indians also brought in skins of raccoon, cougar, beaver, antelope, bobcats and gray wolves.

Mules were another article of trade by Comanches which they captured on their annual raids to the northern provinces of Mexico. These mules were tamed and sold as pack animals.
In another house were the goods that the Indians received in trade, mainly woolen blankets, woolen cloth colored scarlet and blue and used to make breech cloths. There was also printed calico for shirts and thick copper wiring used in making ornaments for arms, legs, and knives. Then there were glass beads, powder, lead, and tobacco.

The rest of the houses were dwelling places for those who worked at the post. There was even a gunsmith appointed by the government who repaired guns for the Indians.
The trading post was also where captives (particularly children) were brought by the Indians for sale. Roemer observed three boys for sale. Delicacies such as dried buffalo meat, and smoked buffalo tongue were for sale as well.

Now fast forward to our Main Plaza. Following Torrey’s store, around 1898, the small building became Ferdinand Simon’s Tavern and then Mrs. Yettie Wiedermann’s Plaza Fruit Store. Then in 1925 A.C. Moeller built a two-story brick building for the Wiedermanns right next to the fruit stand (now Comal Flower Shop). The Wiedermanns moved their business to the bottom floor of their new building and lived upstairs.

By 1932 the wooden building had been torn down and Al Leissner assumed the Texaco dealership that same year. Leissner ran the Texaco station until 1945 when he sold it to Al Schnabel.
NB is fortunate to have such an obvious center of town like Main Plaza, one that is recognizable and incidentally hard to navigate. That indeed makes it memorable. Remember, July 4th celebration  at the Plaza at 9:15 a.m.

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I’m on the riding mower last weekend and encountered some of the least-friendly Texas botanicals: stickyweed (Galium aparino), greenbriar (Smilax bona-nox L.) and agarita (Berberis trifoliolata). I totally detest the first two. The only thing stickyweed is good for is to use in a throwing fight against your friends and siblings, not unlike a poor man’s version of paintball. And, I’ve yet to come up with a way to live peaceably with greenbriar — nature’s own version of barbed wire. But agarita? Now that’s an unfriendly with a good side.

Agarita, or algerita, or agritos, or Texas currant, or chaparral berry (so many names…) is a wild evergreen shrub with bluish-grey/green holly-like leaves. It puts on very fragrant yellow flowers in the spring that lure bees and butterflies. The blooms are followed by bright red-orange berries that are favorites of birds and small animals which leads to the plant’s propagation through — well, you know.

I have many good childhood memories of harvesting the tasty berries. Riding on the back of Grandpa’s pickup truck to “a spot” with lots of agarita bushes, my Grandma, aunties and cousins and I would traipse through pastures thick with mesquite and prickly pear. At a nice full bush, we’d carefully spread a big old sheet underneath the prickly branches and “beat the bush” with and old wood pole to cause the berries to fall. The filled sheet was gathered in and the results poured into big buckets. One by one, each agarita bush was attacked until all the buckets were full. We’d jump back on the truck for the trip home to Grandma’s house where the sheets would be spread out again on the grass. The aunties would pour out the buckets and scatter the berries and leaves over the cloths.

There were so many bugs mixed into the harvest! As the sheet lay in the sun, a lot of the bugs ran off to find cover. I hated this part because there were a lot of what we called stinkbugs and blister beetles crawling around. Then, the berries were winnowed with wind (sheet lifted up and down) and hand-picked to get rid of the pokey leaves. Hours later, the berries were washed and then boiled in water to get an amazing red-orange-pinkish-colored juice. The berries were also smashed and put into a piece of cheesecloth that was gathered up and then hung on a knob of the kitchen cabinet to let more flavor-filled liquid drip into the pot. This juice was then made into one of the most delicious jellies I know. My mom is from north of Fredericksburg; they call agarita jelly, Johahnisbeeren. Apparently it reminded the early pioneers of red currants that grew wild in Germany (named in honor of St. John the Baptist’s birthday). My dad comes from this area where folks call it Berberitzen Gelee — from the Latin name for the agarita. It has always seemed funny to me that these German communties didn’t use the same name.

One of my aunts also took berries and produced agarita berry wine in a storeroom off her garage. She’d bring it out to share with the family at Thanksgiving. It, too, has its own unique flavor — sweet like most homemade wines, with a delicate color and unexpected punch. Most years, you can find homemade agarita wine to taste out at The Museum of Handmade Furniture’s Folkfest (April 13-14). There are usually several different kinds of homemade wines to sample at the booth.

The agarita doesn’t just give us delicious berries. Native Americans found uses for almost every part of the shrub. While seeds and dried berries were identified in the rock shelters of the Lower Pecos River and wood from agarita has been found in campsites around Uvalde, present archeology shows that very few tribes consumed the tart little berries. The Mescalero Apache did make a sort of jelly mixing the berries with an unknown sweeetner which some feel might have been sugar introduced by Anglo settlers.

The Havasupai, some Navajo and other tribes used agarita roots in a tea for treating stomach upset and as a laxative. Other tribes used the antiseptic qualities of the alkaloid-rich root and branches, soaked in water, to create a treatment for wounds, skin, gum and eye problems. Navajo also used a cold infusion to treat scorpion bites (that’s useful info for around here) and a decoction of the leaves and twigs to treat muscle ache and stiffness in joints. And here is an interesting historical tidbit: The Paiute used a decoction of agarita to treat urinary infections and venereal disease.

I haven’t tried any of the medicinal uses of the agarita, but a friend and I had read about Navaho and Mescalero Apache dyeing buckskin and hides yellow with agarita and we decided to try and get a dye. Salvaging a root bulb from an agarita dug out to put in a fence line, my friend and I chopped the yellow wood into small pieces and soaked them in water for a couple of days. The concoction then got more water and was boiled for a few hours. We had made a brilliant yellow dye! We dyed alum-mordanted wool in the dye bath and then spun it into beautiful yellow-colored yarn. Fun fact: During WWII, agarita root dye was one of the hues used to color-code parachutes.

The wonderful agarita’s little green berries are starting to turn red in this beautiful sunny weather. Have those sheets and poles ready for this year’s harvest. Jelly or wine? You win either way.

Sources:

• https://aggie-horticulture.tamu.edu
• https://rangeplants.tamu.edu/
• https://texasbeyondhistory.net/
• http://www.wildedibletexas.com/

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The fall of the worldwide stock market, known as the Great Depression in 1929, was not of major concern to New Braunfelsers. Being an agrarian area, the county was more affected by a serious drought that had occurred in the early 1920s up to about 1925. The effects on crops to the farmers was loss of farmland. Many farmers were just trying to recover from losses in 1929 and what was happening in the rest of the United States was not as important to their immediate needs.

The drought and the stock market fall was met with an increase in population of people moving to Comal County, especially if the move was to seek jobs. The local citizens needed the jobs for themselves so the locals didn’t look too kindly on this increase in population. Is this possibly where the term “aus Lander,” or “out of the land,” comes from? In New Braunfels, the population in early 1920 was 3,590. In 1930 it had jumped to 6,242. Imagine the effect on a town with limited jobs available. Up until this time, jobs were plentiful because business was good, but when the drought came, some farmers and ranchers left their farms to get work in town. Many didn’t plant crops. Even the mesquite trees lost their leaves, and that’s unusual.

The history of Gruene can give you a clear picture of what was happening generally in the county during the depression. The town of Gruene was a major economic contributor to New Braunfels. Can you imagine Gruene as we know it today, becoming a ghost town? Here’s the story of the rise and fall and rise again of Gruene. The rise of Gruene had mostly to do with the importance of the cotton industry and the creativity of Henry D. Gruene.

Gruene was the son of Ernst and Antonette Gruene who emigrated from Germany with the first group of immigrants in 1845. Their son, H.D. Gruene was born in 1847 in New Braunfels. As a young man, he was interested in ranching and was even part of cattle drives from New Braunfels. He returned to Texas in 1872. He purchased some land from his brother in the Gruene area, originally called Goodwin. Along with his new bride, Bertha Simon, he built a home on the Guadalupe River. Here’s where the cotton crop comes in:

Gruene involved himself with the importance of growing cotton. The production of cotton was so important that the economy of the South was referred to as King Cotton. Cotton was actually grown here in the early 1850s. Cotton growing was long gone by the time I was born, so I was surprised to see photographs of bales and bales of cotton brought to town on hundreds of flatbed trucks. Whatever happened to the King?

When Gruene advertised that he was seeking tenant farmers, the response was overwhelming with 20 to 30 families seeking opportunities. Two types of tenant farmers were hired. There were half renters whose implements were owned by Gruene and whose food and clothing were to be bought on credit at Gruene’s Mercantile Store. They gave one half of their crop earnings to Gruene. The other type of tenant farmer was one who had their own implements and teams but gave one third of their profits to Gruene. Each family was assigned a plot of one hundred to two hundred acres according to the size of the family.

Gruene was very successful and established a mercantile store (now the wooden Gruene Mercantile Store) and eventually a gin, lumberyard and dance hall. He built the Gruene Mansion and several family homes and then the red brick mercantile building in 1904. The town flourished into the 1920s.

By 1927 the worst of damage from the drought seemed to be over. Guess who came along in 1925, “a lookin for a home.” The boll weevil. Add this little critter to the drought that was already in progress and the cotton crops were gone. King Cotton was dethroned.

A song about this bug was written by Brook Benton. I’ve taken a few lines from it. Only the last line is to be sung. The rest is stated.

Let me tell you a story about a boll weevil
A boll weevil is an insect
And he’s found where cotton grows
Where they come from no one knows.
The farmer said to the boll weevil
“Say why do you pick my farm?”
The weevil just laughed at the farmer and said
“We ain’t gonna do you much harm
We’re lookin for a home
We’re looking for a hooooooooooooooome.

The tenants were ruined and the farming system stopped in 1938. The San Antonio to Austin road moved to where the IH 35 corridor is now and stopped going through Gruene. Gruene was deserted but like the phoenix (mythical bird), it rose again later.

Large businesses in the county and city suffered losses and loss of tax revenue to governmental agencies from decreased land values. This made progress impossible and slowed recovery. Larger industries like the Landa Industry, and the Planters and Merchants Mill (textile mill, later Comal Cottons) had a big impact on the whole community when Jobs became scarce. But Comal County moved slowly forward until the economy finally moved on.

Much of the information for this paper was taken from a master’s degree thesis written by Iris Schumann, long time coordinator of the aarchives collections of the Sophienburg Museum and Archives. There is much more to the thesis than I have reported here since the thesis covered the depression in Comal County beginning 1920 all the way up to the end around 1938. She covered many human-interest stories about how people came together helping each other out. Her conclusions is that because of this kindness and charity on the part of the citizens, New Braunfels made it through the Great Depression. Thank you, Iris for the contribution of this research to our history.

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