Lyndon B. Johnson State Park "Getting Better All The Time"
Get Back to Basics
STONEWALL, Texas – As a “back-to-basics” movement sweeps the nation—The New York Times recently reported on a growing trend of urban home-reared chickens—Texans who are weary of our modern age, or who are just looking for a glimpse into the past, need go no further than the Lyndon B. Johnson State Park & Historic Site’s Sauer-Beckman Farmstead. The farmstead, complete with barn, gardens and chicken coop complementing the residences, recreates the living and working conditions of a turn-of-the 20th century German-Texan family farm.
Thanks to recent renovations, visitors also can see what original log cabins, some of which date to 1869, and a 1915 Victorian-style house, would have looked like when they were new. Renovations include updates to roofs, porches and a new coat of paint on log cabins and the historic Victorian house. Further renovations are ongoing on another 19th century era log cabin. Visitors can see park interpreters in period clothing doing the farm chores that the original farm family would have done around 1918—feeding, milking, gathering eggs, slopping the hogs, cleaning the house, cooking meals, churning butter, making cheese, scrubbing floors with homemade lye soap and plowing the garden with a team of horses.
The Sauer-Beckmann Farmstead is named for Johann and Christine Sauer, who settled on the property with their four children in 1869, and Emil and Emma Beckmann, who purchased the property in 1900. Augusta Sauer Lindig, one of the 10 children that the Sauer family eventually had, was a midwife who attended the birth of future president Lyndon B. Johnson in 1908.
Tours of the farmstead are available on a first-come, first-served basis. There is no charge for the tours, but donations are accepted. The LBJ state park is directly across the Pedernales River from the LBJ Ranch, which includes the one-room schoolhouse that a 4-year-old Johnson attended in 1912, a reconstruction of his birthplace and the Johnson family cemetery, where LBJ is buried. For group tours, call (830) 644-2252, ext. 229.
Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, 4200 Smith School Road, Austin, TX 78744
