Waisenhaus (Orphanage)
New Braunfels, Comal County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Known as first orphanage in State of Texas. Chartered in 1848 as "Western Texas Orphan Asylum" by L. C. Ervendberg (d. 1863), pastor of New Braunfels. Because of severe epidemics, many children were homeless. At this site Ervendberg built this house (now much remodeled) and began a farm. Here he reared 19 orphans as well as his own 5 children. He also held classes and taught farming techniques. His wife taught housekeeping. Recorded Texas Historic Landmark--1970
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Chartered in 1848 as the Western Texas Orphan Asylum, this was, by tradition, the first orphanage in Texas—born of the deadly epidemics that left many German settler children with no family. Pastor Louis Ervendberg built a house and farm here and, with his wife, raised nineteen orphans alongside their own five children, teaching the children farming and housekeeping as well as their letters.
Why it matters
It represents one of Texas's earliest efforts at organized child welfare, rooted in the hardships of frontier immigrant life.
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Related people
- · Louis C. Ervendberg
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Church Hill School Building
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Built in 1870, this schoolhouse grew out of day classes once held inside St. Martin's Evangelical Lutheran Church, serving the farm families of the Hortontown and Neighborsville communities. For years lessons were taught in both German and English, a reflection of the region's strong German immigrant roots. After serving the public school system, the building was preserved in 1975 as a school museum.
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Promised schools by the society that sponsored their emigration, the German settlers of New Braunfels hired their first teacher in 1845, the year classes began. When the state retracted support for local school districts in 1856, the city persuaded the legislature to create the New Braunfels Academy in 1858, funding it through a local property tax and tuition—making it one of Texas's first tax-supported schools. It taught in both German and English until the state built a public system in 1871.
Hermann Seele
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Part of the wave of German immigrants who founded New Braunfels, Hermann Seele came from Hanover to Texas in 1843 and, in 1845, gathered fifteen children beneath elm trees to become the town's first schoolteacher. Over the following decades he helped organize its first Protestant church, its German-language newspaper, and its cultural clubs, while serving as district clerk, legislator, mayor, and postmaster and recording the daily life of the frontier settlement in his writings.