Books by
Michael Barr
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The
earliest settlers in Sisterdale
drank fine wine from tinkling glasses. They listened to Mozart played
on the piano in the library lined with classical literature. Their
lively after dinner conversation, mostly in Latin, turned to Voltaire,
Kant, Goethe, and Hegel.
The scene was surreal and without parallel on the Texas frontier where
most settlers lived a dark, meager existence.
Nicolaus Zink, a civil engineer and the man who surveyed New
Braunfels, first saw the valley of the two Sister Creeks in 1847
while on his way to Fredericksburg
from Comal County.
He fell in love with the mountain atmosphere in the Sister Creek Valley
and built a cabin there just north of the Guadalupe
River with the Bosom Hills off in the distance.
Zink was an educated man with a large circle of sophisticated friends.
Many of those friends followed him to Sister Creek. Their settlement
became Sisterdale.
Zink's friends were not dirt farmers but urban, cosmopolitan Germans
who had never practiced agriculture before. They were writers, scientists,
artists, noblemen, freethinkers, radicals, anarchists, utopians, and
revolutionaries exiled from the German states following the failed
Revolution of 1848.
They were versed in the best literature and spoke several languages.
They were Germany's best; the most educated and enlightened people
of their day.
Soon a rich intellectual life, filled with music and stimulating conversation,
was in full bloom on the rough-hewn Texas frontier.
Ernst Kapp was an exiled intellectual from Germany. He was a writer,
a political activist, and a teacher at the College of Minden Westphalia.
Among his many scientific pursuits was a deep curiosity about the
cure of diseases with mineral water. Dr. Kapp established a health
spa in Sisterdale in 1853. |
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Edgar
von Westphalen
Wikipedia |
Another early
settler was Edgar Gerhard Julius Oscar Ludwig von Westphalen, the
son of a Prussian baron. Edgar's childhood friend back in Trier, Germany
was Karl Marx. Edgar's sister Jenny married Marx and bore him seven
children.
When Prince Paul of Wurttemburg, a naturalist, botanist, and the brother
of the reigning king, visited Sisterdale,
he was astonished to find such refined drawing room conversation at
a place where he dodged marauding Comanches the day before.
German intellectuals settled at several hill country communities,
commonly called Latin Colonies, but at Sisterdale,
German "Kultur" on the Texas frontier reached its zenith.
Then in 1862 confederate authorities sent a detachment of soldiers
to the Hill Country to deal with the Germans, most of whom were staunch
Unionists. Pressure from the confederates broke up the Latin Colonies.
Most of Sisterdale's
more colorful residents drifted away. Ernst Kapp returned to Germany
leaving two married daughters in Texas. His descendants still reside
in the Hill Country.
Edgar von Westphalen went to England and lived awhile with Friederich
Engels. He then returned to Germany to live with Karl and Jenny Marx
while Karl finished his book, Das Kapital. |
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Sisterdale Dancehall
front view
August 2016 photo © Michael Barr |
Sisterdale Dancehall
sign
August 2016 photo © Michael Barr |
Sisterdale Dancehall
back view
August 2016 photo © Michael Barr |
Sisterdale
Saloon
August 2016 photo © Michael Barr |
Sources:
Hondo Anvil Herald, June 26, 1975, "Early German Community," p13
San Antonio Express, March 11, 1934, "Society and Fashion," section.
New Braunfels Herald, July 20, 1972, "Visit to Sisterdale Home Recalls
Mrs. Kapp's Letter to Germany," p4B.
Fredericksburg Standard, September 9, 1947, "Sisterdale to Observe
Centennial of Founding With Program Next Sunday," p1. |
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