J. Levy & Bro.

Duane's take

The official marker tells it this way, and I'm just the one passin' it along. Now if you want to talk about a business that grew up right alongside Galveston itself — through war's wreckage, through the worst storm this coastline ever saw, through the whole long turn from horse to horsepower — pull up close, because the story of J. Levy and Bro. has got layers.

It starts in Alsace. That's the French region where Joseph Levy and his brother Bernard — everybody called him Ben — were raised in the family livestock trade. Horses were in their blood before they ever set eyes on Texas.

So when they came to America, they came knowing exactly what they had and exactly where it might be useful. They landed in Galveston, and in 1868 they opened J. Levy and Bro. — a livery business.

And the timing matters here. Galveston was still climbing out from under the debilitating effects of the American Civil War. A community like that needs horses, mules, wagons, buggies.

The Levy brothers had all of it. They were building something in a city that was also building itself back up. And they kept expanding.

Around 1880, they added a horse-drawn hearse and other carriages for funeral services. That's not a small pivot — that's a community trusting you with its most solemn moments. They also kept a hand in the competitive side of the horse world, running a racetrack they operated all the way until 1900.

Now. Nineteen hundred. You know what's coming if you know anything about Galveston.

The hurricane of 1900 — devastating doesn't begin to cover it. The marker uses the word devastating, and it earns every syllable. In the aftermath of that storm, there was an extraordinarily high number of burials required in the city.

Ben Levy was appointed overseer of that grim and enormous task. Whatever the Levy name meant in Galveston before that storm, you can imagine what it meant after. Their position as the city's preeminent undertakers was solidified in the hardest way imaginable.

Ben Levy — born in 1849 — died in 1908, eight years after that hurricane. Joseph, born in 1844, carried on until 1922. But the business carried on past both of them.

Their sons inherited it into the twentieth century, and those sons stayed active in the religious and civic life of Galveston just as their fathers had. Meanwhile, the world was changing underneath the company's wheels — literally. Around 1916, J.

Levy and Bro. introduced their first motorized coaches. And in 1918, they formally discontinued the use of horse-drawn vehicles. The brothers from Alsace had built their fortune on horses, and now the horses were stepping aside.

By 1926, the company built a new funeral home, believed to be one of the earliest of its kind in the entire state of Texas. From 1868 to 1926 and beyond — from a livery stable in a war-worn city to a landmark funeral home — J. Levy and Bro. grew right alongside Galveston.

They were there for the races and there for the grief. And when the worst day in the city's history arrived, they were the ones steady enough to answer.

What the marker says

Joseph Levy (1844-1922) with his brother Bernard "Ben" Levy (1849-1908) established the J. Levy & Bro. livery business in Galveston in 1868. Raised in the family livestock business in the French region of Alsace, the Levy brothers came to America with a keen knowledge of horses. They began by offering horses, mules, wagons, and buggies to a Galveston community emerging from the debilitating effects of the American Civil War. About 1880 the Levy brothers began offering a horsedrawn hearse and other carriages for use in funeral services. They also maintained a high profile in other areas of the horse business by participating in races at a track they operated until 1900. Their position as the city's preeminent undertakers was solidified by Ben Levy's appointment as overseer of the extraordinarily high number of burials in Galveston following the devastating hurricane of 1900. About 1916 J. Levy & Bro. introduced their first motorized coaches and, in 1918, formally discontinued the use of horse-drawn vehicles. In 1926, the company built a new funeral home, believed to be one of the earliest in the state. Both brothers and their sons who inherited the business in the 20th century were active in religious and civic affairs in Galveston.