MARIENTHAL, TEXAS. Marienthal, on the north bank of the Guadalupe River ten miles north of New Braunfels in Comal County, was named by James Ferguson for his wife, Marie Hessler; Marienthal means "Marie's valley." In 1848 the firm of Ferguson and Hessler, the first mercantile store in New Braunfels, purchased 300 acres of land from Jacob Raphael de Cordova and established the Marienthal farm. Early county court minutes called the road from New Braunfels to Fischer Store the Marienthal Road. In 1986 the site was on private ranchland.
BIBLIOGRAPHY: Lillian Penshorn, A History of Comal County (M.A. thesis, Southwest Texas State Teachers College, 1950).
