Hoerster Building

Duane's take

Here's my telling of what the official marker has to say about the Hoerster Building. Now, some buildings just stand there. Others seem to collect stories the way a good coat collects dust on a Texas road.

The Hoerster Building, right there in Gillespie County, is the second kind. Built at the turn of the century for a man named J. A.

Hoerster, this limestone Victorian commercial building has been a lot of things to a lot of people over a long stretch of years. And it still looks the part. Walk up and you'll see the original storefront staring back at you, narrow first-story columns holding things up with a kind of quiet dignity, and above that, a second-floor balcony with a balustrade and bracketed columns.

That's not decoration. That's a building that knew it had somewhere to be. Now, after Hoerster's time, the Wieser family took hold of the place and kept it for over fifty-two years.

Over fifty-two years. That is a family that liked what they saw. And the building itself kept busy all the while.

Retail stores moved in. A barber shop set up shop. A dentist, presumably with his own ideas about what it means to make people uncomfortable.

City offices found a home there too. One building, all those lives passing through its doors, under those bracketed columns, past that original storefront that somehow never stopped looking like itself. There's a word for that.

In Texas, we just call it staying power.

What the marker says

Built at the turn of the century for J. A. Hoerster, this structure has housed a number of businesses over the years and was later owned by the Wieser family for over 52 years. The limestone Victorian commercial building exhibits its original storefront with narrow first-story columns and second-floor balcony with balustrade and bracketed columns. Occupants of the building have included retail stores, a barber shop, dentist, and city offices. Recorded Texas Historic Landmark - 1988