The Haas House

In 1882, prominent Austin businessman Ernst Hallman determined to make a dramatic change in his life. Ten years previously, the native of Colberg, Prussia, had been terribly injured in a train accident in Manor, Texas. As a result, both his left leg and right foot had to be amputated. Although he continued working as a district clerk for Travis County for several years afterward, he apparently was ready to leave city life behind. Having purchased more than 2400 acres of raw land west of the city, Hallman and his wife, Johanna Schenck Hallman moved to the Hill Country to raise sheep.

Little is known of the outcome of his venture. For even the toughest and most able bodied of men, the tasks of establishing a ranching operation must have been daunting. Even today, the rocky roads traversing the property Hallman once owned are rough and, during bad weather, treacherous. And yet postal records tell us that from 1883 to 1885, he also served as the postmaster of the community of Colberg in the "Hays/Travis area." Did the native of Colberg, Prussia, give this small enclave the name of his birthplace?

Today, all that is left on the land he once owned is a well-constructed stone building on a high ridge overlooking a tree-lined hollow. The 16-x-35-foot building is coursed masonry: hand-cut limestone laid with a mortar of burned lime and sand. The interior is dirt-floored and one-room wide, although a frame partition divides the interior into two sections.

In the fields surrounding the building, patterns of rock are aligned in large rectangular patterns, perhaps the remnants of corrals or pens. Piles of cut wood, nails, and other building materials indicate that other structures, some say bunkhouses, once stood in the area as well.

Based on the artifacts, the stone structure and outbuildings were used chiefly as a residence and for farm or ranch purposes. As a group, the artifacts date the site from the 1870s to the early 1900s: fragments of heavy white tableware popular in the 1880s and 1890s, sherds of stoneware crocks and churns; bits of bitters, Schnapps and beer bottles from the 1870s to early twentieth century. Parts of a cast iron stove, horseshoes, a metal pail, baling wire, and other objects were found in the adjacent fields.

Yet, ranchers in the area today clearly recall their grandparents' stories describing the stone building not only as a store but also as containing wooden post office boxes, a combination of services typical in rural communities. Small country stores chiefly carried basic items required for everyday life such as flour, sugar, coffee, and salt as well as a limited supply of dry goods and such non-staple items as snuff, bitters, medicine, liquor, and candy. The storeowner and his family often lived in one end of the store partitioned off from the commercial side. Because the objects sold in the store were intended largely for household use, they would be largely indistinguishable from artifacts found in a rural dwelling. For archeologists sorting through these remains, the problem of the building's function was frustrating, and is, as yet, not fully resolved.

Whatever his role—rancher, storekeeper, postal clerk, or all three—Hallman remained at the scenic hilltop compound for only a decade, moving back to Austin with his family shortly before his death in 1892. His widow and two daughters retained ownership of the property until 1907. Today, the small hollow at the base of the hill still carries his name, although the spelling has changed over time.