Bushdale Community

Nobody is sure where the name came from. The Handbook of Texas says only that Bushdale was supposedly named for the area vegetation. The plaque's claim that the county doubled in ten years is easy to check: Milam County counted 8,984 residents in 1870 and 18,659 in 1880, and Bushdale was one place that growth reached. By 1903 its school had one teacher and fifty-seven students. After the school joined Rockdale's district in 1949, the community did not appear on the 1988 county highway map at all, which leaves the cemetery by the roadside as the plaque says.

What the plaque says

Bushdale Community The community of Bushdale was founded in this area of Milam County by German immigrants in the 1870s. Within ten years the population of the county doubled and the Bushdale area developed into a thriving farming community. A community cemetery was established on land owned by John and Johanna Broeckl. In 1878, school trustees Herman Henniger, John Timmerman, Sr., and Paul Pieper purchased two acres south of the cemetery for five dollars. A schoolhouse was erected on the site and it also served as a church on Sundays. In 1883 the Reverend Immanuel Glatzel organized Peace Lutheran Church. A church and parsonage were built on a seven-acre parcel of land donated by Herman Henniger. John and Martha Brockenbush operated a general store in the community, and a cotton gin and blacksmith shop were established by Gustav Backhaus in 1883. A two-story dance hall erected by the Herman Sons Lodge was the site of many social activities. The Bushdale community gradually declined. Peace Lutheran Church moved to nearby Rockdale in 1909, and the school was closed in 1949. The cemetery is the only remnant of this once active community. (1997) Incise on back: Some known early families of Bushdale community area: Backhaus, Bauer, Brockenbush, Broeckl, Dornhoefer, Dockall, Doss, Druschke, Foehner, Gruttner, Henniger, Hirt, Leschikar, Loehr, Mayer, Menn, Pieper, Nieschwitz, Seelke, Seidl, Stolte, Stork, Strelsky, Strube, Timmerman, Vogel, Von Gonten, Voss, Wanoreck, Wenzel and Witkowski.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Milam County Courthouse and Jail — 12 mi
  Cameron's 1892 Renaissance Revival courthouse and the 1895 St. Louis-built jail beside it, now the county museum, are listed together on the National Register.
• Calvert — 30 mi
  A railroad cotton town of 1868 on State Highway 6 that claimed the largest cotton gin in the world and elected Black men to county and state office during Reconstruction.

More markers nearby

• St. John's United Methodist Church — 2.6 mi
• Site of the Mission San Ildefonso — 2.9 mi
• Matinee Musical Club — 3.0 mi
• St. Thomas Episcopal Church — 3.0 mi