The Medieval Castle In Bellville You Can Visit
The passion project of an ornery bakery owner, Newman's Castle in Bellville is as remarkable as it is incongruent with its surroundings
If I had a nickel for every time I toured a medieval castle in rural Texas just northwest of Houston, I would have two nickels. Which isn’t a lot, but it’s weird that it’s happened twice. The first was obviously the Slayer’s Castle at the Texas Renaissance Festival. The second is Newman’s Castle in Bellville, the passion project of an ornery bakery owner that is as remarkable as it is incongruent with its surroundings.
Mike Newman, owner of the nearby Newman’s Bakery, built the castle, which is located down a private dirt road outside Bellville (and only 30 miles from RavenWolf Manor if you want to make a very weird day of the trek). His nephew Chad Welty gives a small lecture to the daily tour groups while his wife Amanda handles the ticket sales. The two refer to themselves as castle managers rather than owners because the property is actually owned by a family trust.
Squinting in the bright Texas sun while holding a claymore, Chad talks lovingly about his uncle, who died in 2024, with parts of the castle still unfinished. He uses the word “stubborn” three times in ten minutes.
“The castle was built entirely by hand and mostly by my uncle himself,” Chad told a large group gathered on Saturday, their busiest day. “He didn’t really know how to pour a foundation, so he did it wrong. Then, he had to break up a lot of it and re-pour it so it wouldn’t become a sandcastle.”
One side of the castle is opulent and well-furnished with beds, sitting rooms, and an enormous kitchen where a daily meal is prepared for all visitors as part of their $15 ticket price. It’s just sandwiches, chips, tea or water, and baked goods from Newman’s, but it reminds visitors that this started life as a home. There are four bedrooms, including a master, and the walls are decorated with pastoral paintings and press clippings about the castle.
The other half is definitely more castle-y. A great hall seats at least forty people. There’s the obligatory cheesy torture chamber with fake skeletons up a narrow stair. Most impressively, Newman built a five-story belltower that visitors can climb, though the stairs have all the grace of a DIY Texas man’s disregard for safety. Watching a heavily pregnant person walk down them ahead of me was a little nerve-wracking.
On a Saturday, the crowd is diverse. At least two little girls showed up in pretty princess dresses for the occasion, posing for pictures with the structure. Since Bellville is roughly an hour from Houston and two hours from Austin and San Antonio, it draws visitors from a good chunk of the state. Several senior citizens arrived on a chartered bus, marveling at the anachronistic building sitting on a private lake and moat.
Newman lived his entire life in Bellville minus a two-year stint backpacking through Italy and Spain. That’s where he fell in love with castles, though the idea lay dormant until 1997. He worked for a while as part of the Bellville Potato Chip Factory, but quickly decided he did not have the temperament to be someone else’s employee. Walking around town, he noticed there wasn’t a bakery, so he drove into Houston every day after his work shift to watch a friend bake for nine months before opening his own.
That mindset comes through in every inch of Newman’s Castle. He didn’t know how to build a drawbridge, but he did it anyway, using what amounts to a giant hamster wheel, it takes two people to operate. It still works, too, though Chad says the entire process is so dangerous they’ve decided not to use it anymore.
Even before the castle was finished as a home for Newman, people were dying to see it. By 2004, he would charge people for tours, though Chad remembers Newman also would put down boards with nails in them down in the driveway to deter unwanted visitors who tried to sneak in the back way. Chad was a little kid when he would have to get out of his mom’s car and move the traps to proceed to his uncle’s house.
“He was a very interesting guy,” said Chad.
With Newman gone, the Weltys continue to re-organize the castle as a tour destination. It’s been used for filming in at least one movie, a short called The Jester that Second Baptist screens at their vacation Bible school. Houston YouTuber Nathan “Unspeakable” Graham spent the night in Newman’s Castle for his 18 million followers. Tours are kept on a strict schedule that ends at 1 p.m. because the castle is almost always hosting special events the rest of the day.
“I have maybe 80 percent of [my uncle’s] drive,” said Chad. “Were excited for the changes we’ve already made over the year, organizationally and logistically. Now we’re talking to the county to see what we can and can’t do.”
Newman’s Castle is open daily for tours. Reservations are required, no exceptions.
