NOVEL INSPIRES A PRINCELY DEED

Visitors to historic downtown New Braunfels, a participating member of the Texas Main Street program, will find a restored and well-preserved city center where specialty retail, dining, lodging, and businesses mix with cultural arts, festivals, and special events. Begin a journey through downtown at the recently restored Comal County Courthouse and enjoy murals, museums, and Old World German bakeries along and adjacent to San Antonio Street.German heritage is in full evidence along the avenues where celebrations like the Wein and Saengerfest, Wassailfest, and the ever popular Wurstfest, the state’s annual ten-day salute to sausage, take place among the preserved architectural icons of New Braunfels’ earlier historic era.

The future site of New Braunfels had already experienced centuries of human activity, particularly around the fresh waters of its Comal Springs, before the arrival of Friedrich Wilhelm Carl Ludwig Georg Alfred Alexander, Prince of Solms, Lord of Braunfels, Grafenstein, Müzenberg, Wildenfels, and Sonnenwalde. Prince Carl (short version) made his way from Germany to his newly purchased tract along the Guadalupe and Comal Rivers in the early 1840s, inspired by novelist Carl Anton Postl, a monk and ordained priest who disappeared from the Order of the Holy Cross with the Red Star in Prague in 1814. Prince Carl obviously recognized the true potential in the New Braunfels’ site as over one hundred and fifty years later the community represents a thriving location for both Texas history and the modern age.

Watch our The First German Texans video to learn more about German Texan cultural heritage in Texas. This video was produced for inclusion in our German Texans mobile tour found in our Texas Time Travel Tours mobile app. Download the app for more videos and travel information: