Fachwerk / Etaerio Club Traditional Geocache
The Great Scotts: Cache is missing.
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Difficulty:
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Terrain:
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Size: 
(micro)
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You are looking for a micro that is well camouflaged. Please replace it just as you found it!
This 157-year-old house once functioned as one of the earliest public libraries in Texas!
Erected in 1852 as the J. C. Stiehl (the first German-born judge in Fayette County) Family Home, it was sold in 1888 to a literary society who created a library here. The first book donated to the library was Robert Louis Stevenson's ST. IVES. The book's donor was mentioned only as "a doctor's wife."
In 1912, a group of women intellectuals formed the "Etaerio Club" from the Latin word for "companionship." The society took their motto from William Shakespeare's LOVE'S LABOR'S LOST: "Learning is but an adjunct to ourselves, and where we are learning is likewise." After obtaining 1,500 volumes for the library, the Etaerio Club disbanded and sold the building to the City of La Grange in 1938.
The structure is an excellent example of what the neighborhoods looked like in the mid-1800s. The architecture is German "Fachwerk" -- using handmade brick and hand-hewn cedar timbers joined with wooden pegs. This German-style architecture is similar to Tudor-style architecture from the Elizabethan Age (a.k.a. Tudorbethan).
Restored from 1967 to 1969 and recorded as a Historical Texas Landmark in 1970, the building remained the public library of La Grange until the Fayette Heritage Museum and Archives (see "Tree of Knowledge" cache on the South side of town at Waypoint GC1AFYK) was built in 1978.
The building is now the League Home of the local Texas Women's League.
Notice the old oak tree next to the building -- How old do you think it is?
Additional Hints
(Decrypt)
cevpxyl fcurer