[Physicist]

Interesting. From what region of Germany did they come, and when?

We're fighting a similar losing battle here in Pennsylvania. Fortunately, we have a larger remaining population to work with, and some communities who still preserve the language (Amish and Mennonites). Still, it's disappearing rapidly.

[RedWhiteBlue]

An interesting tidbit, posted a few years ago: Prince uncovers 19th-century plot to make Texas German

[Dysart]

I really don’t have any specifics about the German emigration to Texas. Surely there must be some Texas FReepers who have knowledge(or an oral tradition) of their origins, however, my roots are largely from Scotland and Ireland and I just haven’t come across too much info of this group. I’d hoped someone would catch this article and add some more detail/personal history. I do know that there are several communities in the Hill Country that have pockets of Texas-Germans. Incidentally, Fredericksburg was recently listed as one of the best small towns in America.

[Aruchu]

My family came in through Brownsville in the 1860’s, they were from Alsace. Ethnic Germans, but today it is in france. Oddly enough the kids there aren’t speaking German anymore, only french.

[jdub]

A German Prince brought his people with him, and founded New Braunfels. Is there a Braunfels region of Germany? On an interesting note, the Prince couldn’t take the weather and went home, and left the people here.

[Proud_texan]

Throughout the entire 1800's for the most part. As best as I can tell most of them were German Catholics and there was heavy advertising in Catholic newsletters in Germany. If I had to guess I suspected it was a real estate thing. Some German had a bunch of land and needed a market. Just a guess.

There's one advertising flyer that's been floating around and it's a hoot. Firstly it said that Texas wasn't as hot in the summer as Minnesota. Uh huh.

Secondly there's this bit that struck me as so funny I had to cut and paste and still have saved:

"Texas is a democratic, free state, and there is no danger at all that fanatic, slippery hypocrites can take power and throw the state into servitude as has unfortunately has happened in many a state of the North. A German can without exception, freely and openly drink his glass of beer. He is welcomed everywhere and his work and services are properly appreciated. As a result of this, Texas can show more immigration, more German communities than most other states; indeed there are entire counties which are almost purely German."

Maybe not then...

For some reason, perhaps simply because of isolation, the German colonies in Texas didn't dilute as fast as they did in other areas of the US.

For whatever reason they held their culture visiting was my first experience of "culture shock" as a Baptist kid coming from a dry county in east Texas.

I think I remember those times with great fondness. Certainly as a bit hungover.

[decal]

There were a number of German settlements started in Texas during the Republic - some have been mentioned here:

The Alsatian settlements in Medina County (Castroville, D’Hanis, Quihi and Vandenberg)

http://www.tsha.utexas.edu/handbook/online/articles/CC/uec1.html

Prince Carl of Solms-Braunfels’ colony (New Braunfels and the surrounding area)

http://www.tsha.utexas.edu/handbook/online/articles/SS/fso3.html

John O. Meusebach’s settlements around present-day Fredericksburg (the treaty he signed with the Comanche was the only one never broken by either side in US history)

http://www.tsha.utexas.edu/handbook/online/articles/MM/fme33.html

Although they’re Slavic rather than Germanic, the Wends of modern-day eastern Germany came to Texas in the 1850s - and beerlovers should be grateful (one of them founded Spoetzel Brewery in 1909 - the makers of Shiner Beer)

http://www.tsha.utexas.edu/handbook/online/articles/WW/plw1.html

[Redbob]

There were actually two German migrations to Texas: one in the earlier part of the 19th century was apparently largely a result of persecution of Catholics in Germany.

The second, in the late 1800s was primarily Germans moving from elsewhere in the U.S. as a result of “developers” luring them here with offers of cheap land and an “ideal climate” in advertisements in German-language newspapers.
There were some VERY disappointed settlers when they arrived in for example Munster and found it to be not the thriving city they’d been told about but a flagpole and a train station!

And the climate...

Even today Munster and nearby Lindsay have more kinds enrolled in the Catholic school than in the public schools.