Ludwig and Caroline Giese House

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'll do my best to do it justice. A German immigrant named Ludwig Giese stepped off a ship in Galveston in 1850, and right away this story is moving. He made his way inland to Fayette County, where he put his back into the work of a teamster and a farmer.

Then the Civil War came calling, and Ludwig served in the Confederacy. When that was done, he came back and settled into the Haw Creek community, and sometime in the 1870s he purchased a farmstead that included the house we're talkin' about right now. Now, this house is what they call German Vernacular in style, and it's got the kind of character that makes you stop and look twice.

Stone piers holding it up. A full-length front porch stretching across the front like an open invitation. And an infilled dogtrot, that old passageway between rooms that generations of Texas builders knew how to use.

Ludwig and his wife, Caroline, she was born a Naeglie, raised ten children inside those walls. Ten. That porch must have seen some mornings.

The remarkable part, and this is where the story earns its ending, is that the house was still in the Giese family at the turn of the twenty-first century. One man arrived in Galveston in 1850 with whatever he could carry, and a century and a half later, his family was still home.

What the marker says

Ludwig and Caroline Giese House German immigrant Ludwig Giese arrived in Galveston in 1850 and made his way to Fayette County, where he became a teamster and farmer. Following service in the Confederacy during the Civil War, he settled in the Haw Creek community, where in the 1870s he purchased a farmstead that included this house. The German Vernacular structure features stone piers, a full-length front porch and an infilled dogtrot. Ludwig and his wife, Caroline (Naeglie), reared ten children here, and the house was still in the Giese family at the turn of the 21st century. Recorded Texas Historic Landmark - 2002