Ida Margaret Schkade Tate

Ida Margaret Schkade Tate. Margaret Tate, "TATE" to her grandchildren, was born in Lexington, Texas. The Schkades were Sorbs (known as Wends in Texas), an ethnic minority descended from Poles and Czechs still living in Lusatia, a German region southeast of modern-day Berlin. While historically Roman Catholic and having their own dialect (Wendish), by the 19th Century most Sorbs spoke German and had become Lutherans. On October 2, 1873, August Frederick Schkade (Margaret's grandfather) disembarked in New Orleans and headed for Lincoln, Texas, by then a major center of Wend life in America. A prototypical, fiercely independent Texas woman, she raised two sons, John and Charles, in San Antonio after the death of her husband, Lieutenant Colonel Charles William Tate (Army, Veterinary Corps), whom she met at age 11 and married just after college. Self-disciplined and fastidious in all habits, including her devotion to Christianity; she never missed church, a verse hymn, or her volunteer duties in her church's altar guild. Margaret also found comforting purpose in nature. She tended and tidied her home's yard just as she did its inside. She grew vegetables and flowers, foraged for wild dewberries and grapes on her sister's farm near Giddings, and canned or home-cooked delicious dishes with the bounty. A humble and selfless person, Margaret would be astonished to have something named for her but would admire the structure's practical respite from sun and rain, the thoroughly planned vegetation, and God's spectacular range of sunrises and sunsets overlooking it all.