1879 & 1907 - August Faltin Building - Comfort, TX
N 29° 57.957 W 098° 54.547
14R E 508768 N 3315015
Located at 7th and Main Streets and part of the Comfort Historic District on the National Register of Historic Places, the original August Faltin Building was built in 1879, while a later addition in 1907 greatly increased the size of the building.
Waymark Code: WMM2TE
Location: Texas, United States
Date Posted: 07/10/2014
Views: 7
Today, they are home to Comfort Crockery, with the business entrance located in the 1907 addition. A Texas Historical Marker on the original provides some background:
Prussian native Friedrich August Faltin (1830-1905) moved to Comfort in 1856 and purchased the general merchandise business of Theodor Goldbeck, located at this site. Trained in his father's store, which had been established about 1818 in Danzig, Prussia, now Gdansk, Poland, Faltin became a leading merchant of the Texas Hill Country. In addition, his 1869 partnership with Capt. Charles Schreiner of Kerrville became the nucleus of the vast Schreiner enterprises.
By the late 1870s Faltin's business, which included banking and post office services, had outgrown the structure at this site and he had architect Alfred Giles of San Antonio design a new building. Constructed by the noted builder J.H. Kampmann, the Victorian Italian edifice was completed in 1879.
Later run by Faltin's sons Richard and August S., the business was sold in 1907 to their brother-in-law Dan Holekamp and his sons Otto and Edgar. That same year an addition to the building was completed. Also designed by Giles, it included second floor space for meetings of fraternal and civic groups. In 1968 the property was sold back to the Faltin family.
The August Faltin Building remains as a symbol of the area's early commercial growth.
Recorded Texas Historic Landmark - 1982
Year of construction: 1879
Cross-listed waymark: Not listed
Full inscription: Not listed
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