DUANE
Duane's take
Here's how the marker tells it, and I'll do my best to do it justice. Maria Katherina Hofius — she went by Catherine — crossed an ocean and half a continent to get to Texas in 1852, arriving from Prussia at the age of twenty-one. She landed in this stretch of Harris County, where German families had already put down roots, and she didn't waste much time getting settled.
She married Peter Wunderlich not long after she arrived, and together they started building something — a farm, a life, a family that would grow to six children. That is the part of the story that sounds like a beginning. And it was.
It just didn't stay easy. In 1864, Peter was killed in a gunpowder mill accident. Six children.
A farm. And now Catherine alone at the center of it all. Now here is where the story gets worth tellin'.
Because Catherine Wunderlich did not fold. She kept managing that farm. She made a home for those six young children.
And then, in 1866 — two years after the worst day of her life — she went out and purchased additional land, and she added sheep and cattle raising to what she was already running. She wasn't surviving. She was building.
Catherine was also a founding member of Trinity Lutheran Church, which tells you something about the kind of community she both drew from and gave back to. She lived right there in the Klein Community, working that land and raising that family, until her death in 1904. Fifty-two years in Texas.
One ocean crossing, one devastating loss, and one woman who just kept going.
What the marker says
Catherine Wunderlich Maria Katherina (Catherine) Hofius immigrated to Texas in 1852 from her native Prussia at the age of 21. She settled in this part of Harris County, populated by numerous German families, and married Peter Wunderlich soon after her arrival. Widowed in 1864 when peter was killed in a gunpowder mill accident, Catherine continued to manage the farm they had begun and made a home for her six young children. She purchased additional land in 1866 and added sheep and cattle raising to the farm operations. A founding member of Trinity Lutheran Church, Catherine continued to live in the Klein Community until her death in 1904. (2002)