The H. M. Ehrenwerth Building is located at 1120 Milam Street, Columbus, TX. It is on the western side of the Colorado County Courthouse Square in the historic downtown of Columbus, TX.
According to the Texas historical marker (WM3W2K) mounted to the center column of the building's facade: "Henry M. Ehrenwerth built this two-story commercial structure in 1873-75 of bricks from a local kiln. Designed for his mercantile store, it housed L.G. Smith's Red Elk Saloon and Gambling Hall in the 1880s. In 1896 the building was purchased by James Ramsey, who operated a hardware, implement, and undertaking business here. His son Charles sold the structure in 1925 to the hardware firm of Leo L., F. J. and Emil E. J. Untermeyer.(1)" It is presently being used to house the Silver Barn.
From the archives of Columbus Library history section, the following description of the early history of the Ehrenwerth Building is extracted: "... Around the same time, a substantial community of Jewish storekeepers had begun to develop in Columbus. In or shortly before 1870, Henry M. Ehrenwerth, Henry Friedlander, and John Rosenfield all opened stores in town. They were joined by Leopold Steiner, who opened a grocery store in 1871. The most prosperous of the early Jewish merchants, Ehrenwerth, succeeded so well that in 1875, he was able to construct a two-story brick building which, when it opened, housed both his store, and, on the second floor, a saloon. Shortly thereafter, Rosenfield also moved into a better facility. His old building was taken over by Nimon Rosenfield, who moved from Weimar to open his own store in Columbus. Meanwhile, Leopold Burgheim had opened a drug store next door to Ehrenwerth's. In 1876, Ehrenwerth's clerk, Adolph Senftenberg, eloped with Minnie Merseberger, the daughter of Mayor Henry Merseberger. Though the bride's father had tried to stop the wedding, when the couple returned, he helped his new son-in-law set up a store in his downtown brick building. Senftenberg, working with his brother who lived in New York, would, in the next decade, build his New York Cheap Store into the largest retailer in the county. The curious residents of Colorado County got their first look at a Jewish religious rite on January 9, 1877, when Alex Dreyfus married Dora Morris in Columbus. Two weeks later, and again a month after that, a rabbi came to town, addressing a crowd at the courthouse. By then, Dreyfus, Joseph Frankel, Louis Mendel, David Steiner, and others, had added their presences to the Columbus Jewish community.(2)" Also found in the archives is a Criminal Case File No. 2414 filed by the State of Texas in 1891 against Henry M. Ehrenwerth for embezzlement(3)! Apparently, Ehrenwerth was a community leader who was not as upstanding as his peers would have wanted him to be. Like so many successful men, he had his dark side, too. But, regardless of the man's history, his store built in 1875 as an expansion of his successful mercantile business is still with us and is still in active use.
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