Ammannsville

Ammannsville, on Farm Road 1383 nine miles southeast of La Grange in southeastern Fayette County, was settled during the 1870s by German and Czech immigrant farmers on lands originally allotted to the Fayette County schools. The first settler in the community was Andrew Ammann, who arrived on March 12, 1870. He was a noted architect as well as a farmer. Other early family names included Kossa, Sobolik, Heller, Stefek, Fietsam, Munke, Bartos, Holster, Lidiak, Ohnheiser, and Zoesper. In 1876 the first business opened, and by 1879 the town had a post office and a public school. A Catholic church and school opened in 1890 with Father Jules Vrana as priest. The church was destroyed by a storm in 1909 and rebuilt and dedicated on November 24, 1910. Shortly thereafter it was destroyed by fire and again rebuilt. In 1900 Ammannsville had three stores and saloons, two blacksmith shops, one drugstore, one physician, and two gins. The post office was discontinued in 1906; mail was delivered from Weimar until the 1920s and subsequently from Schulenburg. The public school closed in 1909. The First State Bank of Ammannsville was chartered in 1914, when the population of the extended community was estimated at 800, with 100 living in town. In the 1980s fewer than fifty people lived in Ammannsville. The Catholic church, surrounded by a few remnant businesses, remained the focal point of community life. In 1990 the population was forty-two, where it remained in 2000.