The Voigt House

Duane's take

The official marker on the Voigt House in Comal County tells it like this, and I'll do my best to do it justice. Now, every good story starts with the land, and this one's no different. Back in 1845, a lot was deeded to a man named Hermann Seele, the schoolmaster of New Braunfels.

You picture him: a man of books and chalk dust, holding title to a piece of ground that had no idea yet what it was going to become. That ground would wait. It had patience.

Then, in 1870, along comes Dr. John P. Lehde, and he builds something worth talking about.

A fine Mansard-roof house. Now a Mansard roof is the kind of thing that makes a passerby slow down and look twice, all those slopes and angles saying, somebody here had taste and meant for you to notice. Dr.

Lehde put that house up and it stood. It stood well. Then 1893 arrives, and the story changes hands in the way the best stories do.

The family of Gustav Voigt takes ownership, and they don't let go. Gustav himself, born in 1854 and gone in 1927, was the anchor. But the family kept the line running.

Frank B. Voigt, born in 1892, went on to serve as a state legislator before his death in 1951. Think about that thread: a schoolmaster's lot in 1845, a doctor's elegant house in 1870, a legislator's family carrying it forward into the twentieth century.

One piece of ground, New Braunfels, Comal County, and all of that living layered right inside those Mansard walls.

What the marker says

On lot deeded in 1845 to New Braunfels schoolmaster Hermann Seele. Fine Mansard-roof house was built 1870 by Dr. John P. Lehde. It has been owned since 1893 by family of Gustav Voigt (1854-1927), and Frank B. Voigt (1892-1951), a state legislator. Recorded Texas Historic Landmark - 1973