Albert Nebgen House

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and here's how Duane tells it back to you. Out in Gillespie County, there stands a two-story farmhouse with a story rooted deep in the Texas Hill Country soil. Albert Nebgen had this place built for his family around 1918.

Now Albert was a native Texan, born of German immigrant stock, and that heritage is written into every timber and stone of this farmstead. It is, the marker tells us, representative of the homesteads established by the area's early German settlers. That's not a small thing to say about a house.

That's a whole way of life preserved in wood and plaster. Albert himself came into this world in 1889 and lived until 1965, and for a good stretch of those years, this farmhouse was the center of his family's world. The house follows what's called an I-plan, two stories tall, with a front porch that was originally open to the Hill Country air.

But families have a way of growing, and by 1921 that porch was partially enclosed to make room. You can almost picture it. A little more shade, a little more shelter, a few more chairs pulled in close.

The Nebgen family held onto this place, kept it in their ownership, all the way until 1945. Nearly three decades of a family's life bound up in one farmstead. The focal point, the marker calls it.

And standing out here looking at it, it's not hard to see why.

What the marker says

A native Texan and the son of German immigrants, Albert Nebgen (1889-1965) had this farmhouse built for his family about 1918. The two-story I-plan house is the focal point of a farmstead that is representative of those established by the area's early German settlers. The front porch, originally open, was partially enclosed in 1921 to accommodate the growing family. The home remained in the Nebgens' ownership until 1945. Recorded Texas Historic Landmark - 1988