- Albert, Texas
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Albert, Texas Location within the state of Texas
Albert, TexasCoordinates: 30°11′38″N 98°36′06″W / 30.19389°N 98.60167°WCoordinates: 30°11′38″N 98°36′06″W / 30.19389°N 98.60167°W Country United States State Texas County Gillespie Elevation 1,476 ft (450 m) Population (2000) – Total 25 Time zone Central (CST) (UTC-6) – Summer (DST) CDT (UTC-5) ZIP code Area code(s) 830 FIPS code 48-01660[1] GNIS feature ID 1377922[2] Albert, originally Martinsburg, is a ghost town 16 miles (25.7 km) southeast of Fredericksburg and 1 mile (1.6 km) west of the Blanco County line in southeastern Gillespie County, Texas, United States.[3] The town was a stop on the Fredericksburg-Blanco stage route[3] and in 1967 became a stop on the President's Ranch Trail.[4]
In late October 2007, the town was put up for sale on the auction website eBay.[5]
Contents
Early history
On December 15, 1847, a petition was submitted to create Gillespie County. In 1848, the legislature formed Gillespie County from Bexar and Travis counties.
For more details on this topic, see List of Petitioners to Create Gillespie County, Texas.While the signers were overwhelmingly German immigrants, names also on the petition were Castillo, Pena, Munos, and a handful of non-German Anglo names.
The first white settlere were George Cauley, Ben White, Sr., and a man named Jacobs.[3] Around 1877, blacksmith Fritz Wilke, George Maenius, and John Petri moved from Fredericksburg seeking pasture for their cattle.[3] Wilke bought land from a man named Elmeier, who was robbed and murdered years later.[3]
The Martinsburg post office operated from 1877 to 1886.[3] In 1892, Martinsburg got a new post office and a new name, after Albert Luckenbach sold his store in Luckenbach, and arrived to register a new post office in town, under the name Albert.[3]
A school was established in 1891, and in 1897 postmaster Otto Schumann opened the town's first store. In 1900 a new school building was erected where Lyndon Baines Johnson was briefly enrolled.[3] A local Lutheran mission, the Lutheran Church of Stonewall, was established in 1902 which LBJ attended.[3]
Population decline
Albert had 50 residents in 1925, only 4 in 1964, and 25 in 1972.[3] By 1985 the store had been torn down, the school converted into a community club, and the dance hall a storage locker, though Albert still had 25 residents and two businesses.[3] The population would stay at 25 through 2000,[3] but by 2007, the town had been all but abandoned.
Since 2004
In 2004, Bobby Cave, at the time an insurance broker, bought Albert—more specifically, property on Ranch Road 1623 between Stonewall and Blanco[6]— for $216,000.[7] Cave then built a tavern (in a style area locals call an icehouse) on the site of the town's former general store; after investing nearly half a million dollars[7], in 2007 he put it up for sale on eBay[6] with a reserve price of $2.5 million.[5] In 2009 the town was carved up and again for sale, this time with an asking price of $883,000.[8] 12.09 acres (48,900 m2) of the town was purchased by the Easley family (Point Evans, LLC) from Austin, Texas, and Brandon Easley, was nominated by the family to be the town manager. [9] He has made several improvements to the ice house and surrounding property, and currently the dance hall is under renovation.
References
- ^ "American FactFinder". United States Census Bureau. http://factfinder.census.gov. Retrieved 2008-01-31.
- ^ "US Board on Geographic Names". United States Geological Survey. 2007-10-25. http://geonames.usgs.gov. Retrieved 2008-01-31.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Martin Donell Kohout: Albert, Texas from the Handbook of Texas Online
- ^ President's Ranch Trail from the Handbook of Texas Online
- ^ a b White, Elizabeth (2007-10-31). "Texas town for sale on eBay". Associated Press, via The Boston Globe. http://www.boston.com/news/odd/articles/2007/10/31/texas_town_up_for_sale_on_ebay/.
- ^ a b Historic Texas Town for Sale Albert TX on eBay
- ^ a b Owner lists small Hill Country town for sale, a June 2007 article from the Fort Worth Star-Telegram
- ^ Why buy a house when you can purchase a town?
- ^ http://propaccess.trueautomation.com/clientDB/Property.aspx?prop_id=21752
External links
Municipalities and communities of Gillespie County, Texas City 
CDPs Unincorporated
communitiesBlumenthal | Cherry Spring | Crabapple | Doss | Grapetown | Luckenbach | Tivydale | Willow City
Ghost towns Albert | Cain City | Eckert | Morris Ranch | Pedernales | Zodiac
Categories:- Geography of Gillespie County, Texas
- EBay listings
- Ghost towns in Central Texas
- Populated places established in 1877
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