Station: [16] Hofstetter House - Owner
Time for a spot of gossip – and what better subject than the history of the Hofstetter House from Grasheim.
It was the year 1880. A young married couple called Schedlbauer had bought a small farm with just 2 hectares of land – that’s only five acres, not enough to make a living from farming. But the husband, Michael, was a shoemaker and set up his workshop in the parlour. Locals nicknamed him “Bartschuster” – roughly “beard cobbler” – for his luxurious beard. Along with the young couple, Michael’s father also moved in. He retreated to the “Austragstube” – the equivalent of a granny flat. That’s why this small house has two separate entrances, as you’ve no doubt noticed.
At our next stop, you’ll hear more about how this particular kind of retirement arrangement worked.
31 years after getting married, the shoemaker’s wife died. Michael Schedlbauer moved into the granny flat, which was by this time unoccupied, and handed the farm down on to his daughter Veronika and her husband. Theirs was not a happy marriage, and the husband eventually emigrated to the US. Veronika was unable to run the farm on her own and passed it on to her older brother Josef.
However, Josef married a local widow and moved in with her. Our small farm went to the widow’s daughter and her husband, Alois Oppenheimer. This photograph from 1925 shows the young couple. The wife is pregnant, and there’s also their little son, aslo called Alois. – And next to them is Michael the shoemaker, who was still living in the house.
Just before Christmas that same year, the husband, Alois senior, fell off a ladder and died. His young widow gave birth to a daughter a few days later. In 1927, the widow married Josef Hofstetter, with whom she had more children. In 1942, the family moved to a bigger farm.
Josef’s brother, Michael Hofstetter, and his wife became the new owners. Both lived on the farm until they died in 1989.
The derelict house was bequeathed to our museum for dismantling. We’re showing it as it was in 1923.