Tiny Texas town is ripped in two as newcomers launch new German beer festival ... trends now

A Tiny Texas town has been torn in two by a rift over rival beer festivals. 

Tensions among locals in Muenster, a rural community settled by German immigrants, have been brewing over the competing events which happened over three days in April. 

The dispute began over differing opinions about how to distribute the proceeds from beer sales at the town's biggest event of the year - Germanfest - and the influx of tourists to the formerly community-focused event. 

For the first time in decades, a rival event sporting beer, sausages, music, and lederhosen-clad natives sprang up on the other side of Division Street during the same weekend. 

'It put tears in my eyes,' local resident William Fisher, 83, told the New York Times. 'All of a sudden it seems like the town went haywire.' 

Many of the people who opted for the new festival - Party In The Park - said the original celebration had been overrun by tourists. 

Germanfest now attracts around 20,000 visitors each year, something locals have said has put a dampener on its authenticity. 

It all began in 2018 when the festival moved to a new, spacious indoor space at the edge of town which allowed more stalls and more room for visitors.     

'It became more of an outsider thing and lost that local touch,' Leslie Hess Eddleman, a dental hygienist and former Dallas Cowboys cheerleader told the NYT. 'They turned it into this big show for out-of-towners, but not for us.'