Henry Troell

In 1895 Troell installed hydroelectric generators on his dam to run his mill and light the town, and the plant is credited as Seguin's first pumped water and electricity system and one of the first hydroelectric plants in Texas. The dam was not new. William Saffold had built a small gristmill on a natural rock ledge in the Guadalupe in 1865, and Troell bought it in the 1880s and added rock to raise the water to power a cotton gin. Later he moved his milling elsewhere, and the city bought his property in 1907.

What the plaque says

Henry Troell (October 5, 1838 - December 19, 1921) A native of Wichmannshausen, Germany, Henry Troell moved to this area sometime prior to 1860. He served in the Confederate Army and in 1872 married area native Johanna Woehler. A successful freighting business enabled him to invest in several local properties and enterprises, including an innovative dam/grist mill operation at this site. He expanded the mill's water and hydroelectric generation capabilities and in the 1890s provided the city its first water and electric utility systems. His entrepreneurial and business legacy represent an important part of the city's development. (1994)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Sophienburg Museum and Archives — 14 mi
  The hilltop where Prince Carl of Solms-Braunfels raised the Adelsverein's headquarters in 1845, now the museum and archive of the German colony that became New Braunfels.
• Gruene Historic District — 15 mi
  A cotton town on the Guadalupe that the boll weevil emptied, rescued in the 1970s by a kayaking architecture student, with a dance hall that says it has never closed.
• Palmetto State Park — 23 mi
  Dwarf palmettos, bogs and a spring-fed oxbow on the San Marcos River, with CCC stonework from the 1930s, a swamp an hour from Austin and San Antonio.
• Spring Lake and the Meadows Center — 24 mi
  The headsprings of the San Marcos River, among the longest-inhabited places in North America, once an amusement park with a swimming pig and now seen from glass-bottom boats.

More markers nearby

• Saffold Dam — steps away
• The Guadalupe River — steps away
• Claiborne West — 0.8 mi
• Timothy Pickering Jones — 0.8 mi