DUANE
Duane's take
Here's my telling of what the official marker has to say about the early settlement of Boerne, Kendall County, Texas. Before the 1850s, this stretch of land along Cibolo Creek belonged to Native American groups — the Comanche among them — and the country had just a handful of roads cutting through it. Two of those roads carried names that still sound like history when you say them out loud: Camino San Saba and Camino Pinta.
That's the stage as it stood before a surveyor named John James came along and started drawing lines in the dirt. In 1850, James sold four hundred acres along Camino San Saba on Cibolo Creek to a man named William Friedrich. And what did Friedrich do with it?
He handed it over to an experiment — a socialistic farming commune. No name was ever hung on the place, so it simply went by what it sat on: the Cibolo Creek commune. Seven men had come over from Darmstadt, Germany, and six more arrived fresh from the Llano River Bettina colony, that earlier venture which had gathered roughly forty members at its height.
Put them all together and you've got a small, ambitious settlement out on the Texas frontier. Now, the commune didn't last — short-lived, the marker will tell you plainly — but those young men left something behind besides memories. They picked up two nicknames that followed them wherever they went: Darmstädters, for the region in Germany they hailed from, and Vierziger, meaning forty, a nod to that earlier Bettina colony.
Some of those former commune members didn't drift away from the county at all. They stayed, and they became prominent. But we're getting ahead of ourselves.
In 1852, John James — the same surveyor from before — joined with Gustav Theisen to plat a proper town right there adjacent to that failed commune, also near Camino San Saba. They named it Boerne, after Karl Ludwig Börne, a German writer. William Friedrich, who'd owned those original four hundred acres, showed up as an early settler in the new town.
So his name threads through the whole story. Boerne started filling out. A grocer and saloon owner named August Staffel became the town's first postmaster in 1856.
The town sat along Camino San Saba — by then being called Fredericksburg Road — and it served a real purpose: a rest stop for travelers who needed one. Out here, that was no small thing. In 1858, Boerne was folded into the new Blanco County.
But the residents didn't sit still for that arrangement long. By 1859, Boerne residents were among those filing for the creation of a new county — Kendall County, which came into being in 1862. And here's where those old commune nicknames pay off.
Four former members of that unnamed Cibolo Creek commune — Adam Vogt, Leopold Schultz, Phillip Zoeller, and Christoph Flach — stepped into civic leadership roles in the new county seat. Men who'd arrived as part of a short-lived farming experiment ended up helping shape the government of a Texas county. Kendall County and Boerne kept growing after that, the marker says, on account of natural assets and a strategic position near the major roadways.
The same roads that brought the first settlers in kept bringing more. Some places are just built for that kind of story.
What the marker says
Prior to the 1850s, Native American groups, such as Comanche, inhabited the Cibolo Creek Land that would become Kendall County. The country possessed a few existing roads, such as Camino San Saba and Camino Pinta. John James conducted initial surveys in the area and, in 1850, sold 400 acres of land along Camino San Saba on Cibolo Creek to William Friedrich, and it was used as a socialistic farming commune. The unnamed Cibolo Creek commune was populated by seven men from Darmstadt, Germany, with six members of the previous Llano River Bettina colony which had gathered approximately forty members. The Cibolo Creek commune was short-lived but the young men garnered two nicknames: DArmst��dters (a region in Germany) and Vierziger ("forty"). Several former Cibolo Creek commune members moved to later settlements in Kendall County and became prominent. In 1852, John James and Gustav Theisen platted the adjacent town of Boerne, named after German writer Karl Ludwig B��rne, also near Camino San Saba. William Friedrich was an early settler in the new town. Grocer and saloon owner August Staffel became Boerne's first postmaster in 1856. The town provided travelers a much-needed rest stop along Camino San Saba, now called Fredericksburg Road. The settlement was included in the new Blanco County in 1858, but in 1859, Boerne residents were among those who filed for the creation of Kendall County (1862). Former commune members Adam Vogt, Leopold Schultz, Phillip Zoeller and Christoph Flach held civic leadership roles in the new county seat. Kendall County and Boerne continued to experience growth due to its natural assets and strategic positioning near major roadways. (2023)