H and H Coffee

Dedicated to the history of the Hoffmann-Hayman Coffee Co. founded 1899 in San Antonio, Texas.

J. C. Neeley

J. C. Neeley was the fourth member of the first-year Board of Directors of the Hoffmann-Hayman Coffee Company at its 5 February 1912 Texas charter. He is not one of the three incorporators (W. E. Hayman, Mrs. William R. Hoffmann (Minnie), and Gus P. Menger) but is named alongside them as the +1 on the first-year board, bringing the directorate to four.

The single attestation

Only one primary source on this site names Neeley — the 5 February 1912 Express Austin Bureau wire item, reprinted in the 6 February 1912 San Antonio Express-News:

AUSTIN, Tex., Feb. 5. — The Hoffmann-Hayman Coffee Company of San Antonio. Capital stock $20,000, of which three-fourths has been paid in. Purpose: general merchandising. Incorporators: W. E. Hayman, Mrs. William R. Hoffmann, and Gustave Menger, San Antonians. First year’s directorate: the three incorporators and J. C. Neeley. Term: fifty years.

The companion San Antonio Light 6 February charter notice — 1912-02-06-san-antonio-light-san-antonio-firm-chartered — covers the same filing but omits Neeley, naming only the three San Antonio incorporators. The Express-News longer treatment is the only on-site source that records him.

What we don’t know

  • Full given names. The wire item uses initials only — “J. C.” — and no later source on this site identifies him.
  • Profession and relationship to H&H. Whether Neeley was a San Antonio businessman, a Hayman associate, an investor, a banker representing the capital stock contributors, or a friend-of-the-incorporators slot is undocumented. Texas corporate filings of this era often required at least one outside director for the first-year board; Neeley may have been filling that conventional role.
  • Tenure on the board. The charter language locks him in for the first year only (“first year’s directorate”). The next on-site attestation of H&H’s officer roster is the August 1921 San Antonio Light board listing, which names R. W. Menger, L. B. Menger, G. P. Menger, and Mrs. William J. Schlosser — Neeley is gone by then, and there’s no documentation of when he rolled off.
  • Local civic profile. No San Antonio newspaper, city directory, or trade-press reference on this site mentions a “J. C. Neeley” outside the 1912 charter notice.

Open questions

  • Who was J. C. Neeley? A USPTO TESS / trademark search would not surface a personal name; the more productive sources are: 1912 San Antonio city directories (Polk’s), 1910 / 1920 federal census records for Bexar County, and Texas Secretary of State filings naming him as an incorporator or officer of other companies during the 1910s.
  • Why was he on the H&H board? A coincidence of address with one of the incorporators (e.g. shared business at a nearby downtown street), a family connection (the Hoffmann or Menger families had relatives with the surname Neeley in San Antonio in the 1910s — worth checking), or a banking/legal relationship are all plausible.
  • When did he leave the board? A 1913 or 1914 H&H board listing (if one exists in Tea and Coffee Trade Journal or local trade press) could narrow the exit window.

See also