Let’s go to Luckenbach, TX. With Waylon and Willie and the boys. …
By: Tim Moore
Tags: Music, Success, Texas, Willie Nelson

With Waylon and Willie and the boys. . . .

Recently I drove from Austin, and my daughter drove from San Antonio, to Luckenbach, TX. It’s about a 90 minute drive for me and 60 minutes for her. Luckenbach is a place my kids and I have been going to for over 20 years, and we have seen countless performances from many fine artists.

Now, if you don’t know about Luckenbach, here’s Waylon and Willie to refresh your memory:

For a more formal history of Luckenbach, try this:

Luckenbach’s oldest building is a combination general store and saloon reputedly opened in 1849 (1886 is more likely, based on land improvement records of the Texas State Library and Archives Commission) by Minna Engel, whose father was an itinerant minister from Germany. The community, first named Grape Creek (perhaps really a faulty spelling of “Gap Creek”, the literal meaning of “Luckenbach” in German), was later renamed after Engel’s husband, Carl Albert Luckenbach. Luckenbach was first established as a community trading post.

Luckenbach’s population increased to a high of 492 in 1904, but by the 1960s it was almost a ghost town. A newspaper advertisement offering “town — pop. 3 — for sale” led actor Guich Koock and Hondo Crouch, a rancher and Texas folklorist, to buy Luckenbach for $30,000 in 1970, in partnership with Kathy Morgan. Hondo’s wife, Shatzi paid for the town, and Guich’s wife, Patricia, worked as the bartender and bookkeeper. Guich used the town’s rights as a municipality to govern the dance hall as he saw fit. The town has been host to many unique festivals including the Luckenbach Women’s Chili Cookoff and The 1st Luckenbach World’s Fair, where Willie Nelson made a surprise appearance.

Needless to say, Luckenbach is one of the special places on this earth. Willie once said that places like Luckenbach and the now-gone Armadillo World Headquarters in Austin are places, and I paraphrase, where the rednecks and the hippies came to listen to good music — and everybody got along. There are few better places to go people-watching than Luckenbach, from Harley Hog lovers in full leather to farmers to city dwellers to suburbanites with kids, everybody comes to Luckenbach to smile and get along.

I mention all this partly because I love Luckenbach, but also because it came up as we were “warming up” before the podcast we did with Human Potential gurus Jack Canfield and Stewart Emery. I mentioned to Stewart that Luckenbach would be open on the coming Sunday, and I was going!

Stewart, who has been LITERALLY EVERYWHERE on earth and has met a Who’s Who volume of world class and renowned people on this planet, started explaining to Jack about what a great place Luckenbach is. He got downright wistful talking about a day he spent with me at Luckenbach about a decade ago. Jack, he said, it was one of the best days of my life.

You see, you have to have a Luckenbach (your special place) to go to and find the best version of yourself — just to remind you all is well in your universe.

So, in the legendary words of that philosopher and founder of modern Luckenbach:

Everybody’s Someone in Luckenbach!

And, thank you, Hondo!

Btw, if you want to listen to that podcast with Jack Canfield (Chicken Soup for the Soul) and Stewart Emery, go to: