Hochheim Prairie

Hochheim Prairie was on State Highway 111-and near the home of pioneer settler Valentine Hoch-about six miles west of Yoakum in northern DeWitt County. The community centers were a school, a turnverein building, and St. Anne's Catholic Church. The school was organized in 1893; a larger, two-room structure was built in 1897 and a two-room stucco building in 1925. Its largest reported enrollment was 125 pupils; it closed in 1950. The turnverein building, erected in 1892, was known as Turner Dance Hall after 1897. St. Anne's Church was established in 1906 by Jacob Poth and John Weigelt and served twenty-one families from the area. Its congregation grew to eighty-eight families by the 1940s and was still active in 1961. The Hochheim Prairie Mutual Fire Insurance Company was organized in 1896 in the turnverein hall but was moved to Yoakum after 1948. By the 1930s Hochheim Prairie had become closely associated with the newer communities of Pearl City and Petersville nearby. By 1983 St. Anne's Church and cemetery, located roughly midway between Pearl City and Petersville, was the only evidence of Hochheim Prairie still shown on the county highway map.