Wonders Never Cease for Fayette County’s Adventurous Martha Tauch

At 104 years of age, Martha Tauch finds the world as fascinating a place as she did as a youngster

Adapting to new technology might be intimidating for some of us, but Martha Tauch takes it in stride. On a Zoom meeting ably hosted by Schulenburg Regency Social Worker Tracy Psencik, the 104-year-old birthday girl felt right at home. Also on the call were Martha’s son, Arnold, and his wife, Joanne, and me.

Although I’d had the privilege of interviewing Martha when she turned 101 three years ago, I still had questions for this bubbly centenarian whose zest for life is contagious. Martha was anxious to answer every one in a conversation that lasted over an hour.

Long, long ago

Martha says her earliest memory dates back to about 1920, when she would have been four years old. She was in the screened porch of the family’s rented farmhouse near Komensky, Texas. With a puppy for company, she watched as her mother and dad, Adolf and Anastesia Pelech, picked cotton in a nearby field.

She can still hear her father singing the anthem “America the Beautiful” at the top of his lungs in Czech as he planted his cotton every spring. It’s her favorite season, too.

Martha says that as soon as her father could afford it, he bought a farm near Bauersville, Texas, in Lavaca County, where she attended school. Over the years, the classrooms increased from one to three rooms to accommodate all the farm kids in the area.

“We had a bilingual school – Czech and German. My teacher, Mr. Smothers, who taught in the German language, was very progressive,” Martha recalls.

Instead of sticking to the basic curriculum, he challenged the students’ ingenuity by setting up a school band, in which Martha played the cymbals, and starting a basketball team.

Martha began to learn English when she was five years old.

“When I graduated from eighth grade, I went to the school in Moulton, the Sam and Will Moore Institute. I worked very hard and my favorite subject was math. I was such a good student that I was chosen valedictorian of my graduating class.”

That was a significant accomplishment! In that era, few families bothered to send their daughters to high school and few who had that opportunity excelled at their studies.

“My teacher came to me and said that I had done so well I would get a scholarship to go to college. Oh, I was happy. I knew I didn’t want to be on that cotton-pickin’ farm all my life!”

But the evening before graduation, Martha received devastating news. In reviewing her record, it had been discovered that eight years of her education had been in a country school. Therefore, she was ineligible for an institute scholarship.

“Yes, I was very disappointed, but then my husband, Arnold, came along. From then on, I never regretted that I couldn’t attend college,” she says.

“But over the years, I have put my math skills to work by helping several students who were struggling with the subject.”

Riding the rails Tauch-style

By 1943, when the greatest adventure of their lives began, Arnold and Martha had two little boys, Arnold Jr. and David. The Southern Pacific Railroad had promoted Arnold to gang foreman and the Tauch’s new home was a fully furnished boxcar that shuttled up and down the mainline between Houston and El Paso, Texas.

“I felt like I saw the world from that boxcar,” Martha says.

For several years after the Tauch family settled in Flatonia, they had frequent uninvited visitors: hungry hobos.

“When the trains would come through Flatonia, I think they jumped off and started running straight to the Tauch home!”

Martha described them as good men who were down on their luck. She says never once did she feel uncomfortable or threatened when she answered a knock on the back door.

“I always gave them a sandwich and coffee. Sometimes it was fried eggs, whatever I had. One man came back and said to me, ‘Lady, could I have another cup of coffee, please,’ so I gave him one. I never minded helping them.”

When asked to identify the greatest inventions during her lifetime, Martha didn’t hesitate.

“This,” she said, tapping the screen in front of her. “The computer!”

“I remember when my son came home from college and said he’d seen something called a computer. It was bigger than this room. Now look at it. I can’t get over what the computer in front of me on the desk can do. It’s wonderful.”

She thinks the greatest invention for farmers like her dad was the tractor and for women, surely the refrigerator topped the list.

“Now we can have ice cream every day of the week!” Martha says.

Speaking of food

With a straight face, Martha says she doesn’t have a favorite food.

“I love it all!” she says, bursting into laughter. Then she reconsiders and says if she had to pick, her top choices would be chicken noodle soup, turkey and dressing or a good steak.

Martha has high praise for the cooks at the Schulenburg Regency Nursing Center.

“The food here is really good and there’s so much. Sometimes I have to leave some, but it’s not because I don’t like it. I enjoy my meals!” she says.

Even though Martha lost her mother when she was six years old, she remembers her mother taught her to make cookies. She also remembers what would happen if she didn’t tell the truth.

“My mother would get after me,” she says.

Mr. Smothers, who taught Martha at Bauersville School, also instilled in his students an appreciation for art, which unlocked her budding artistic talent.

“He showed us how to paint a picture on a piece of glass and then turn it over to preserve it,” Martha says of one exercise.

That experience has stayed with Martha. She has endeavored to add beauty to her life and those who are closest to her.

“I’ve always wanted to make everything prettier. If it’s pretty to start with, I look for a way to make it even better.”

Martha’s favorite color is yellow. Whether it’s an exterior color or inside a house, she says it’s as if the sun is shining.

“I have a yellow picture in my room here that I wish I could show you. I have always liked yellow roses, too.”

A big-time history buff

Martha has a deep appreciation for history: both her own and other people’s families. Over the years, she assembled a great deal of local history that otherwise might have been lost.

When Ann Arnim, the widow of Judge Sam Arnim, was determined to donate over 2,000 artifacts to a museum, Martha was invited to join the board of the newly formed E.A. Arnim Archives and Museum in Flatonia. Martha was such a tireless volunteer that in 1986, she was selected as “Flatonia Citizen of the Year.”

However, Martha’s proudest accomplishment is helping to reunite two branches of a family that had been traced back to two 1904 orphan train adoptions in Flatonia.

“In mid-2003 when I was keeping the museum, a lady named Delores Guinn from Sugar Land came in with her son and daughter-in-law. She was searching for information about her father who had come to the area on an orphan train,” Martha says.

Delores had attended the orphan train reunion in High Hill but had found no information there. She wondered if the museum might be able to help her.

“Delores didn’t know her father’s birth name or his nationality. All she knew was he had been adopted by Augustine Kubenka. When I showed her the lengthy history and picture of Augustine Kubenka in the Fayette County history book, she put her hand over the picture and said, “That’s my grandfather! That’s my grandfather!”

“Then she shed some tears.”

As Martha was making a copy of the Kubenka history, she noted that the family had four daughters of their own. When they adopted the four-year-old boy, who was the Delores’ father, they also took a little girl, who was less than a year old, from the orphan train.

“That little girl grew up and married Julius Vyvjala, our neighbor of 40 years. I called Mrs. Vyvjala’s daughter, Julie Stryk, to tell her that her adopted uncle’s daughter was at the museum looking for family history.

“Julie was stunned. She said she had been at the High Hill reunion looking for Delores, but hadn’t been able to find her. On Aug. 10, 2003, Julie put together a family reunion at the American Legion Hall in Flatonia so the long-lost relatives could meet.”

Martha says there was lots of loving and hugging, which ranked high on her “joy of history” experiences.

Martha also served on the school board, chamber of commerce and spearheaded the establishment of a railroad museum in Flatonia.

Another community stalwart, Ervan E. Zouzalik, called her “Mrs. Flatonia” in a 2006 letter honoring her 90th birthday.

Recipe for a long life

Martha credits her long, long life to a combination of factors: laughter, being kind, loving your neighbor, being accountable and having a good mother and a happy, loving family life.

“I’ve never taken much medicine. I’ve just been healthy,” she says. “I would take it if I needed it, though.

“I’ve always enjoyed the outdoors and made it a point to get some Vitamin D the old fashioned way – from the sun when I worked in my garden.”

She’s also been an ardent community volunteer. Last year, Martha was presented with the key to the city at a council meeting. Never one to miss an opportunity to promote a lighter moment, Martha innocently inquired if the key would open the doors at the banks.

Always say thank you

According to Martha, it’s good manners to express thanks and show gratitude. Such was the case when repairs needed for her favorite walker were no longer available.

“We contacted the factory in Ohio and asked if we could buy the part, but that model was no longer being manufactured. However, an employee went to a great effort to find an old walker, take off the part we needed and send it to us. Mother was so pleased because we were able to fix her walker,” son Arnold says.

“Of course, Mother insisted that I write and thank the company. Better yet, I decided to send them a photo of Mother using her repaired walker. When the president of the company saw the picture, he was so impressed that he had it blown up. Mother’s photo now hangs in the middle of his plant as a reminder to his employees of how important their jobs are! Mother was pleased about that, too,” Arnold explains.

“Incredible,” he adds softly.

Yes, incredible is a perfect word to describe the precious Martha Tauch!

If you’d like to read more stories written by Elaine, visit www. elainethomaswriter.com/blog/ and sign up to receive new posts twice a month. You can also call Elaine at 979-263-5031.