THE DAUGHTERS OF THE REPUBLIC OF TEXAS LIBRARY
Col 893
Conrad A. Goeth Papers
1838-1955
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Collection information
Physical description: 54 document boxes, 6 flat storage boxes, 3 oversize boxes
Acquisition: Acquired from Fred White, Jr., 1973, 1993
Processed by: Warren Stricker, 1993
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Table of contents
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One of nine children, Conrad Alexander Goeth was born November 2, 1869 in Blanco County, Texas. His parents, Carl A. Goeth (1835‑1912) and Ottilie Fuchs Goeth (1836‑1926) were born in Germany, coming to Texas with family when young. Members of the family were prominent in the German community of central Texas, and Carl Goeth held a number of public offices, including Blanco County Commissioner and State Representative (1887‑1888).
Conrad A. Goeth attended the University of Texas, graduating from the school of law in 1890, establishing a legal practice in San Antonio that year, with his law school classmate, William A. Wurzbach (1869-1939), under the name Wurzbach and Goeth. The partnership continued until 1896. For a short time, Goeth practiced on his own, and in partnership with H.R. Ihrie. In about 1902, he joined James E. Webb (1859-1916) in the firm Webb and Goeth. Following Webb's death, the firm became known as Goeth, Webb and Goeth, joined at various times by Goeth's sons Fred and Arthur, and James E. Webb, Jr.
Conrad Goeth was active in a number of civic and private organizations, serving as a director of the Southwest Insane Asylum (San Antonio State Hospital), the Protestant Home for the Aged, and of the City Water Board. He was married in 1893 to Carrie Groos. Following her death, he married Nellie N. Skogard, in 1934. Conrad A. Goeth died in San Antonio on February 22, 1953. Fred C. Goeth continued to practice under the name Goeth, Webb and Goeth until about 1960.
William A. Wurzbach was also the son of a well-known German immigrant family. His father, Charles L. Wurzbach (1835‑1892), was City Attorney of San Antonio, Bexar County Judge, and served five terms in the state Legislature. Following his association with Conrad Goeth, William Wurzbach formed a partnership with his brother Harry McCleary Wurzbach, among others, continuing to practice law in San Antonio, serving in the state Legislature for one term, and as Bexar County Judge.
Born in Grimes County, Texas, James E. Webb taught in public schools before beginning his legal studies, coming to San Antonio in 1889 to practice law. He was associated with W.P. Finley before entering into his partnership with Conrad A. Goeth. Webb served as San Antonio City Attorney, and ran for Mayor in 1911, when he was narrowly defeated by Bryan Callaghan. Webb had two children with his first wife, A. Zulch Webb. Following her death, he married Amanda P. Fenley, with whom he had one son, James E. Webb, Jr. James E. Webb died March 26, 1916 in a fire at the San Antonio Country Club that killed five others.
References
Biographical Encyclopedia of Texas. New York: Southern Publishing Co., 1880.
Blanco County News. Heritage of Blanco County, Texas. Dallas: Curtis Media Corporation, 1987.
Chabot, Frederick C. With the Makers of San Antonio. San Antonio: Artes Graficas, 1937.
Daniell, L.E. Personnel of the Texas State Government with Sketches of Representative Men of Texas. San Antonio: Maverick Printing House, 1892.
Daniell, L.E. Texas: the Country and its Men. n.p., n.d.
Daughters of the Republic of Texas Library. Goeth Family, vertical file.
Daughters of the Republic of Texas Library. James E. Webb, vertical file.
Daughters of the Republic of Texas. Wurzbach Family, vertical file.
Davis, Ellis A. and Edwin H. Grobe, eds. The New Encyclopedia of Texas. Dallas: Texas Development Bureau, 1930?
Goeth, Ottilie Fuchs. Memoirs of a Texas Pioneer Grandmother. Burnet, Texas: Eakin Press, 1982.
Moursund, John Stribling. Blanco County Families for One Hundred Years. n.p., 1958.
Consisting of correspondence, legal documents, financial records, and printed material the Conrad A. Goeth Papers document the professional and business activities of the San Antonio attorney, his family, and his legal partners.
The scope of the papers is defined by the legal career of Conrad A. Goeth, the bulk of the material dating from 1889‑1940. Each of the law firms with which Goeth was involved are represented, along with material associated with his law partners, particularly William A. Wurzbach and James E. Webb. Also included is correspondence dating from 1889‑1892, directed to Charles L. Wurzbach, the years immediately before his death. Some of the papers date to James E. Webb's earlier legal partnership in the firm Webb and Finley, and some of Webb's personal and business activities are represented as well.
The papers are arranged into nine series: I. Client and Correspondent Files. II. General Correspondence. III. General Legal Material. IV. Land Grants. V. Deeds. VI. Financial Documents. VII. Printed Material. VIII. Maps and Plats. IX. Miscellaneous Material.
The majority of the material is part of the Client and Correspondent Files, which gathers together related material under the names of individuals or entities represented by the law firm; the names of correspondents, usually other attorneys or business associates; or the political, fraternal, or other organizations with which members of the law firms were associated.
General Correspondence consists of routine business letters, correspondents represented by only a single item, or letters where the subject or author could not be determined.
The other series consist of various document types not associated with any of the Client and Correspondent Files.
I. Client and Correspondent Files
Boxes 1-46, oversize and flat storage boxes
The most extensive series, this consists of material associated with individual legal clients, corporate entities, and correspondents. The files are in alphabetical order by the individual or corporate name of the client represented by the firm, the name of the correspondent, or other subject name. While a majority of the material is related to the work of Conrad A. Goeth, items involving other members of the various partnerships are found in this series, as well as some material which was produced by his law partners outside of an association with Goeth. In addition to correspondence, files may contain legal documents, financial documents, printed material, notes, and other document types. Individual legal documents, financial documents, printed items, and other items not associated with the entities in this series have been placed in other series, according to document type. Because the original order of the papers was almost completely lost, these files were recreated during processing. Those few files which were received intact have been maintained, and the original file title is noted, if it existed.
A wide range of legal actions are documented in these files, including land transactions, recovery of property, damage claims, estates, collection of debts, arrangement and collection of loans, divorce, and a few criminal actions. Items within the files are usually arranged chronologically, though in the case of complex matters, document types are sometimes separated.
Many of the files contain a small amount of material, primarily letters received by the law firm, associated with a single issue. Several long-time clients are also represented, with a large amount of material documenting a number of different cases or a complex and lengthy legal transaction. Significant examples of the latter include: The estate of San Antonio attorney Henry E. Barnard; Joseph Cotulla, the defendant in a suit over the Buena Vista Ranch, in Webb and Dimmit Counties, Texas; the Fidelity and Deposit Company of Maryland; A.H. Geisenberger; the German Evangelical Synod of North America, for which Conrad A. Goeth was a trustee and legal advisor. Much of this material is related to the management of the Synod's property, including the site of its San Antonio home for the aged and other land around Texas. Related material is found in the files for Martin Schmidt, the donor of the property upon which the Protestant Home for the Aged was located; the Gus Giesecke estate; various damage claims against the Western Union Company; the George Hammeken estate; the Lone Star Kaolin Co.; the Reinhold Probandt estate, which included property adjacent to the Alamo in San Antonio, now part of the Alamo grounds; a damage suit involving the Rambler Automobile Co.; the Henry and Julia Runge estate; the San Antonio Machine and Supply Co.; Walter Tips; the estate of Mexican General Gerónimo Treviño; and Uhl, Goeth and Deussen, a partnership involving Conrad A. Goeth in the development of property in La Salle County, Texas.
Other significant clients and correspondents include the W.F. and M.A. Cronkey estate; the National Exchange Bank vs. Albert E. Mitchell, et al.; C.H. Dean; the George Dieffenbach estate; Groos National Bank; Guenther Milling Co.; the Josephine Hutzler Heintz estate; H.R. Ihrie; the John Ireland estate; George W. Johnson; George Koerner; the Erich Menger, Sr. estate; Ronse and Wahlstab; San Antonio Compress Co.; William Schoch; the Eugene Sibley estate; F.H. Woolls, the manager of one of Goeth's farms; and Frederick Wulff.
Conrad A. Goeth occasionally worked on criminal cases, including Texas vs. E.E. Howerton, Texas vs. J.A. Ortiz, and Switzerland vs. Heinrich Kägi.
Organizations, most of them from San Antonio, and usually represented by a small amount of material, reflect either legal representation or membership. They include the Bexar County Anti-Prohibition Organization; the Business Men's Club; the Commission Government League; the San Antonio School Board; and the United States Federal Emergency Administration.
Several Goeth family members are represented by correspondence, particularly Adolf C. Goeth, Carl A. Goeth and Max Goeth. Other related families are represented, including correspondence from members of the Fuchs, Wenmohs and Kellersberger families. Much of this family correspondence is related to business matters. Some personal items of James E. Webb are also included, much of it related to his estate.
Because of the German heritage of Conrad A. Goeth and William A. Wurzbach, which included German language ability, many of their clients came from the large German immigrant community of central Texas. Goeth and Wurzbach often represented these immigrants and their families in dealings with the German government, both in Germany and Texas, and with attorneys in Germany. Much of the correspondence with these clients is written in German. Correspondence with the German Consulate in Galveston deals with a variety of clients and legal issues.
In order to insure the privacy of living individuals associated with legal actions, access to some papers less than 60 years old is temporarily restricted. Closed files are noted in the inventory.
The file list in the inventory includes the file title, with the names of significant correspondents or subjects contained in the file listed in parentheses below the title, followed by the date span of the material in the file. Files containing correspondence addressed solely to Charles L. Wurzbach are noted in the inventory.
Boxes 47-51
Correspondents represented by a single letter, letters covering routine business, and unidentified letters are filed chronologically in this series. The bulk of this correspondence is dated prior to 1918. Two letterpress books of outgoing correspondence are also part of this series.
Boxes 51-52, oversize and flat storage boxes
Legal documents not associated with any of the client and correspondent files are filed chronologically. These include a number of contracts and leases, many involving Conrad A. Goeth. Also in this series are records of the legal activities of the law firms, including dockets and notarial records.
Oversize box 61
The series consists of two land patent certificates, not associated with any of the Client and Correspondent Files series.
Box 52
Miscellaneous deeds are arranged alphabetically by the name of the individual conveying the property. Deeds that are related to the same property, are filed together under the name of the individual conveying the property in the earliest transaction.
Box 53-54, oversize boxes
This series contains ledgers containing financial records of the law firms, and bills and receipts, for both business and personal expenses, including records from farms owned by Conrad A. Goeth. Also included are a few scattered documents associated with clients of the law firm.
Box 54
Primarily miscellaneous personal items, such as invitations, newspaper clippings, certificates and cards. Several clippings are related to Carl A. Goeth's campaign for the state legislature in 1908.
Oversize box 61
Miscellaneous maps of San Antonio and Texas, along with plats and sketches of property in Texas. Some items are not identified.
Box 54
Includes school material of James E. Webb, Jr. and Fred Goeth, among other items