Trinity Evangelical Lutheran Church

The church that stands here was designed in 1907 by the Victoria architect James Hull and built by the contractor Fred Urban, and it opened in 1908. It was the congregation's third meeting hall. Hull's simplified Gothic Revival sanctuary kept most of its exterior and interior features, and the spire came off in 1969 because of deterioration. A 1986 survey of historic Victoria listed it, with Our Lady of Lourdes and Casino Hall, among the buildings that mattered to the whole German community.

What the plaque says

Trinity Evangelical Lutheran Church German immigrants of the Victoria area began holding Lutheran worship sevices in private homes as early as the 1840s. The organizational meeting for this church, the first Lutheran congregation in the county, was conducted on December 14, 1851. Under the leadership of the Rev. William Strobel, the members raised funds for the operation of the new parish. In a charter meeting the following year the congregation was formally established as the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Victoria. The name was changed in the 1860s, during the pastorate of the Rev. Ulrich Berner. Active in area service, the church has sponsored missions in the nearby communities of Coletoville, Inez, and Tivoli. In addition, members also supported the Indianola ministry of the Rev. Frederick Flath. Other programs have included a school which closed in 1895, the Ladies Aid Society, now the Lutheran Church Women, and the Lutheran Brotherhood. All worship services were conducted in the German language until 1914 when English was first used on a limited basis. Additional buildings at this site were constructed later for the church, which has remained a significant area institution since the 1850s. (1981) 1981

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• De León Plaza — 0.2 mi
  The central plaza of Guadalupe Victoria, the only predominantly Mexican colony in Texas, founded by Martín De León in 1824 and taken from his family after 1836.
• Museum of the Coastal Bend — 1.7 mi
  Victoria College's museum of thirteen thousand years on the middle Texas coast, from Clovis hunters and Karankawa potters to La Salle's lost Fort St. Louis and the first ranches.
• Fannin Battleground State Historic Site — 16 mi
  The open prairie east of Goliad where Fannin's retreating column formed a square short of the Coleto Creek timber on March 19, 1836, and surrendered the next day.
• Fannin Memorial Monument — 25 mi
  The 1938 pink granite memorial over the common grave of Fannin's men, shot on the roads out of Goliad on Palm Sunday 1836, the grave itself found again only in the 1930s.

More markers nearby

• The Victoria Advocate — steps away
• Our Lady of Lourdes Catholic Church — steps away
• Hauschild Opera House — steps away
• Mitchell School — steps away