Marion State Bank

The bank was a neighborhood investment. Six men held the largest blocks, ten shares or more: H. D. Dreyer, L. Kuehler, W. J. Schneider, Henry Wimmer, Arlon B. Davis and R. L. Wuppermann, with Wuppermann and Kuehler living in Seguin and Davis in New Braunfels. About thirty smaller shareholders came from Marion, Seguin, San Antonio, Valley and Cibolo. The town they banked in began as a railroad workers' camp, and its townsite was laid out in 1877 when the Galveston, Harrisburg and San Antonio Railway arrived. The bank has paid its dividends through its history.

What the plaque says

Marion State Bank The town of Marion began in the 1870s as a marketing and shipping point on the Galveston, Harrisburg & San Antonio rail line. It grew steadily and, in the early twentieth century, began to develop as an important commercial center for the area. A cotton gin opened in 1904, followed soon by an electric plant and a telephone company. As part of that progress, Marion State Bank received a charter on October 26, 1906. H.D. Dreyer served as the first president, with Dr. Louis Hirschfeld as vice president and Henry Wimmer as cashier and secretary; all were directors. The other initial directors were L. Kuehler, W.J. Schneider and Arlon B. Davis. Marion State Bank began operation in the first floor rear area of the H.D. Dreyer building, which also housed the Waldorf Club, a local saloon. The bank purchased the property in 1910 and moved to the front part of the building. It remained at that site until 1987, when it relocated to new facilities here. Marion State Bank was among the first state chartered banks in Texas, and it remains one of the state's oldest community-based financial institutions. Throughout its history, it has been a key player in area development, serving Marion and nearby communities Zuehl, New Berlin and Santa Clara. The institution has paid dividends regularly to its investors over the years, even during the Great Depression. Today, Marion State Bank serves as a reminder of the area's early history, as well as its steady growth and development. As with its founding, the bank continues in service as a hometown institution. (2006)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Sophienburg Museum and Archives — 8.9 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 — 12 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.
• Natural Bridge Caverns — 15 mi
  The largest known cavern in Texas, found in 1960 by four college cavers under a ranch family's land, entered beneath a 60-foot limestone bridge and still growing.
• The Alamo — 23 mi
  Mission San Antonio de Valero before it was a fort: a church its builders never finished, a thirteen-day siege in 1836, and the Army gable of 1850-52 that became its emblem.

More markers nearby

• Marion Public Schools — 0.3 mi
• Founding of Town of Marion, 1877 — 0.3 mi
• St. Paul Church — 5.0 mi
• Schertz — 7.6 mi