Soon after moving to New Braunfels, Bill and Bonnie Leitch began “looking for a perfect place to live away from city life” in the city. For that matter, the house they found in 1971 is very close to downtown but has the feeling of being “outside the city”. The home was an old Victorian beauty in a neighborhood that had changed, located on a street whose name had even changed. The house itself was still preserved and the Leitches bought the house and made it their ambition to restore it.

The house was located on Grand Street. Never heard of it? That’s because Grand Street (only one block long) changed to Hill Ave. and I bet you know where that is. It parallels Academy running next to the railroad track and then goes up the hill for about a block. This property was located in the Jahn Addition. The whole area was originally owned by Johann Jahn, the furniture maker in 1846. The property was later given to Carl and Emma Jahn by their mother, Anna Jahn, upon the death of their father, Johann Jahn.

The lot on which the house is located is really a double lot and the original property was two double lots, extending from Grand St. (Now Hill) straight through to Academy.

When Carl Jahn inherited the four lots, he sold two of the lots to Heinrich Blumberg and two to Johann Wahl. In 1905 and 1906, both Blumberg and Wahl sold their four adjoining lots to Frederick Hofheinz.

Now we get to the builder of the house that the Leitches bought. Records show that Frederick Hofheinz was 11 years old when he emigrated from Germany to Texas with his parents, Johannes and Emilie Hofheinz from Nassau in Germany. In 1852 this family landed on the coast at Indianola. After a difficult nine-day trek inland, the family settled in Hortontown, a small settlement across the Guadalupe River from New Braunfels. Very shortly after arriving, Johannes died of cholera, which affected so many emigrants at the time.

Frederick, as the oldest child, took on the responsibility of taking care of his mother and his younger siblings. He went to work as a teamster, hauling freight from the coast into the interior from age 14 until he was 22 years old.

During that time Frederick had moved to Kendall County and joined Captain E. Jones’ volunteers organization to guard the frontier from Indian attacks. In 1864 he married Emilie Wilke of Kendall County and started farming and ranching. Emilie was born in Lavaca, moved to New Braunfels where she went to school, and later moved to Kendall County with her parents. This is where she met Frederick. The couple eventually had four sons- Adolph, Hugo, Bruno, and Max. They also had two daughters, Adele (Mrs. Otto Beseler) and Emma (Mrs. Hugo Liesmann).

Frederick Hofheinz was very active politically in Kendall County. For several years he was elected Justice of the Peace and County Commissioner. In 1903 he was elected state president of the Order of the Sons of Hermann. He finally turned over management of the ranch to his son and the couple moved to New Braunfels.

When the Hofheinzs moved to New Braunfels (1905), they bought the four lots from Blumberg and Wahl and began building their home in the middle of the lots with the front facing Grand St. and the back facing Academy Ave. The old carriage house is still standing behind the house.

Before he died in 1918, Hofheinz became one of the principal founders of the New Braunfels State Bank. Both he and Emilie are buried in the family plot in the Comal Cemetery. Their headstones include porcelain portraits of the couple.

Now the house began its own journey, reflecting the change that time brings. First the house was sold to Charles Knibbe in 1920 and when Knibbe died in 1927, his children inherited the property and house on Hill Ave. and the other property on Academy at the back of the house. These were the four lots originally bought by Hofheinz.

During WWII the house was divided into three apartments. During this time the neighborhood deteriorated. A lack of housing in New Braunfels and the increase of train traffic was probably the reason. If you ask anyone that lives close to train tracks if they are bothered by the trains, the standard answer is, “What train?”

Then Ella Bremmer, daughter of the Knibbes, sold the house to Bruno and Elizabeth Schoenfeld who moved into the house. Schoenfeld’s son, Herman, built a home for himself and his wife, Lila, on the Academy St. half of the lots. Bruno, who was a brick layer by trade, made many improvements. He planted the pecan trees that still embrace the property and cut a cellar under the front porch. The elder Schoenfelds lived there the rest of their lives. Bruno died in 1959 and then Elizabeth in1968. When both were gone, the house stood vacant for three years until it was purchased by Bill and Bonnie Leitch.

Much time and love has gone into the restoration of this house, done mostly by the Leitches. A central tower and spindled friezework (gingerbread) accent a curved porch. Sitting on that front porch is an amazing experience. The window shutters were replaced. The 14- foot ceiling inside, with transoms to let the air circulate by the fans, above the longleaf pine floors, are original. Longleaf pine wood is now extinct and this house has longleaf pine decorative wood throughout. All the windows are the original glass, giving the appearance that only wavy glass windows can create. The ceiling is pressed tin with tiles in the hallway that were salvaged from the original Carl Schurz School.

Once a building like that is gone, it’s gone. A beautiful Queen Anne house has been saved from the chopping block by Bill and Bonnie Leitch. Viele Danke!

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I walked into Henne Hardware and the bell rang above the door alerting the clerk that someone had entered. I was immediately greeted by two cats named Clifford and Eugene, so named by owner of the store, Paul Martinka. These cats, or at least their names, will bring back memories to those of you who remember the Henne family. Clifford and Eugene were the last of that family to own the business and that was years ago. Perhaps Paul named the cats after the Hennes to remind him of the roots of that store. Cliffy and Gene certainly brought memories to me and it will to a lot of you that were hanging around in the 1940s, 50s, and 60s.

The roots of Henne Hardware, as were so many of the stores that have local roots, began in Germany. Johann Henne, his wife, Henrietta Deppen, and their five children boarded the ship Hercules with 152 other passengers from Germany and arrived in Galveston in August of 1845. From there they were taken by schooner to Indianola where they engaged wagons to move inland to New Braunfels. They were fortunate to have survived the first Texas winter that took so many lives on the coast, on the inland trek, and in New Braunfels.

Johann was a tinsmith and in 1846 he bought a lot on San Antonio St. for which he paid $120. He opened a tinsmith shop and had a thriving business. Electricity wasn’t in homes and streets until after the 1900s, two years after Harry Landa introduced electricity to NB. Until that time there was a big demand for tin oil lanterns inside and outside. Just imagine San Antonio St. without any electric lights or lights from the inside of buildings. Repairs on the Austin, San Antonio Stage Co. coach lamps were made at Hennes. Tin roofing was made a necessity in 1893 after a city ordinance was passed requiring tin roofing in the city.

In 1857 Johann died and when he did, his son, Louis Henne, took over the tinsmith business. He was only 17 years old at the time, but it became his responsibility to take over the business and support his mother and siblings. He was the only child of Johann and Henrietta that married. Louis then named the business Louis Henne Co., Tin and Sheet Iron Ware, Stoves, House Furnishing Goods and Mitchell Wagons.

With time, Louis Henne began other businesses such as a lumberyard on the corner of Castell and Coll Sts. and a plumbing business. In 1893, right next to where the tinsmith shop was located, Louis built a beautiful Victorian-style business building sitting right in the middle of the business district where it remains today. It was built by contractor Christian Herry. Herry came from Germany to New York after serving two years in the German army during the Franco-Prussian war. He had the reputation of being a master at building trusses of cathedrals, building them on the ground and raising them completed into place. He came to New Braunfels in 1881 and one of the first projects was the addition of frame wings to the limestone New Braunfels Academy.

The building still retains much of its original décor, inside and outside. The walls are brick, the flooring is oak and the ceiling is pressed tin. The inside of the store is ornate, as the Victorian architecture called for. Still on hand are some original display cases and nail bins. There are revolving cabinets for small articles. The shelves containing merchandise reach from floor to ceiling. Way up at the top, next to the ceiling, the original old shelves hold antique items and then under those shelves are newer items. The sliding ladders are still there in order to reach the top shelves. The ladders slide on steel runners. Near the cast-iron cookware section, you can look up and you can also see some wooden water pipes used in early New Braunfels. Now where else can you see that?

Before banks were well established, mercantile stores provided those services. The office area at the back of the building with its large built-in safe is a reminder of this practice. Cash registers were not used. Still visible are the remnants of the money trolleys.

There is also an elevator going upstairs and downstairs into the basement. Many of the immediate downtown buildings have basements. I had heard that the basement at Hennes was a favorite spot for card-playing men. Going down a steep set of stairs into the basement, I can see how a secluded area, half the size of the building, would be an intriguing place to get together to socialize. Glass tiles from the sidewalk let in a small bit of light. In the basement is a well about 25 feet deep that fills with water according to the amount of rain. Paul Matinka pointed out it reflects the water table and when there was lots of rain, the well would fill up and even spill over. The well was dug before the building was built.

Over the years, Louis Henne acquired more property on the block where the store is located. His family’s two story home was built at the back of the property on Mill St. He also maintained a camp yard for customers who came into town on weekends by wagon. They would camp there and return home the next day. It was one of several such campgrounds complete with wagons and campfires and of course, lit by tin oil lanterns. The large barn-like building behind the store was the lumber storage.

Louis Henne was the only one of his seven brothers and sisters that married. He married Emilie vom Stein and they had five children. He was active in the formation of the Volunteer Firemen’s association. One of Louis’ sons, Adolf, succeeded his father as head of the store when Louis died in 1912. Adolph remodeled the store, adding the show windows and adding interior shelving and display cases. He carried on his father’s interest in fire prevention. When he died in 1945, the business went to his three sons: Clifford, Eugene, and Norman. Clifford and Eugene took over the store and they were the last Hennes to own the store. Clifford became the sole owner in 1962.Ten years later the business was sold to Donald Stott and James Goodbread and then to the Bob Schima family. The present owner bought the business in 1996 and the property in 2000.

Paul Martinka has managed to have merchandise that you can’t find anywhere else and even some that is no longer available. Look for well-made unusual toys for Christmas. There is a very large collection of cast- iron cookware and pottery from Marshall, Texas. Martinka has devoted his time to maintaining historic Henne Hardware.

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