Manchaca home slated for demolition this fall

In 1899, William Henry Birkner, a successful farmer and stone mason, built a home for his wife and nine children in the unincorporated community of Manchaca in southern Travis County.

The home is still standing 114 years later but is scheduled to be torn down as part of the development of the Hills of Bear Creek subdivision, historian Marilyn Dunnahoo McLeod said.

The developers, MileStone Community Builders, had looked into preserving the house but determined it could not be saved, she said (see sidebar).

McLeod said MileStone had been accommodating to work with and allowed the Manchaca Onion Creek Historical Association to photograph the house.

The land in Southern Travis County was starting to be divided in the 1830s, but few people settled there because of the number of American Indians there, McLeod said.

Gottfried Birkner was born in Germany in 1833 and emigrated to the U.S. in 1858.

He fought in the Confederate army and defended Galveston during the Civil War, great grandson Alan Owens said.

Gottfried Birkner moved west of FM 1626 and south of Bear Creek around 1875.

The Manchaca of Gottfried Birkner's day had a thriving business community, McLeod said.

"According to maps at the Texas General Land Office, the train reached Manchaca by 1880," she said. "Old newspapers indicate that the cotton gin was operating by 1899. From the summer of [1882–1883], more than 46,000 pounds of grain were shipped out of Manchaca on the International and Great Northern Railroad.

"Oldtimers remember peak years when 5,000–6,000 bales of cotton per year were processed at the gin."

Gottfried Birkner and his wife had six children. Gus Birkner described life in the area in his 1942 autobiography.

"I worked around the neighborhood on the farms, and my father took such things as sweet potatoes or bacon for my labor," he wrote.

"Father [Gottfried Birkner] built rock chimneys and underground cisterns for the farmers and ranchers, taking cows and hogs in trade for his labor."

The Birkners were expert stone masons and built many area chimneys and cisterns, McLeod said. Gus Birkner had worked on the Texas Capitol building, while William Birkner had contributed to the Manchaca School—now the Austin Christian Academy—and an earlier version of the Manchaca Methodist Church.

William Birkner and his wife, Theresa Siebert, had bought more than 100 acres from his father and built the house in 1899.

The Birkner family moved to South Congress Avenue in 1927, but they may have owned the farm until the late 1930s before selling it to the Johnson family, Owens said.

The Johnsons' daughter, Martha Johnson, grew up in the house. She had sold the land where the house stands to MileStone, McLeod said.

"I think it's so neat because it's so old," she said. "All of the brickwork is intact. It's not leaning—it is standing upright."

Why is it being demolished?

MileStone Community Builders purchased the land on which the house stands in 2012, President/CEO Garrett Martin said.

The company hired a historian to evaluate the house and learned that the house had "no historic value," he said.

MileStone researched moving the house elsewhere on the property and was told by contractors that it would crumble if moved.

The company also learned the house had asbestos, which ruled out leaving it in place for health and safety reasons, he added.

Martin said MileStone plans to preserve the grove of trees near the house.

Gottfried Birkner's home

Across FM 1626 from the Birkner/Johnson house stands Gottfried Birkner's home.

According to his son Gus's autobiography, Gottfried Birkner and his wife, Hellena Stoffers, had bought a "one-roomed box house" on a 3-acre plot of land that now belongs to Marbridge, a ranch that offers private housing, assisted-living facilities and job training for mentally challenged adults.

"Rocks were numerous around there, so [Gottfried] built a rock fence around the place, raised a good garden, and rented land from his neighborhoods to farm," Gus wrote.

"He built some rock rooms onto the box house and made a good house out of it. The old homestead is [still there]."