History of the Alsergrund
Today's 9th Viennese district , Alsergrund , originated in 1850, when seven suburbs in the north-western part of Vienna between the inner city and the Linienwall were summarized and incorporated to Vienna. The provisional municipal law of the monarchy, enacted with an imperial patent on March 17, 1849, stipulated that suburbs always have to form a unified local municipality with the actual city. From 1850 to 1861 Alsergrund was the 8th district; With the division of the original 4th district into the new 4th and 5th district, the Alsergrund received the district number 9.
An important traffic connection, the Limes road, ran through the district as early as Roman times . The first settlement took place in the Middle Ages, and the medical tradition of the district was established in 1179 with the establishment of a hospital for leprosy patients. The area was shaped in the Middle Ages in particular by the founding and possessions of monasteries. The people lived from agriculture, viticulture and fishing. The devastation of the Hungarians and the Turks repeatedly destroyed the small settlements in the district, the increased settlement in the 17th century was thrown back by the outbreak of the plague and the second Turkish siege of Vienna .
It was only in the wake of the reconstruction and the creation of the protective line wall that the impetus for the expansion of the suburbs in today's district area and for the construction of numerous large buildings was created. The growth of the population was followed by the construction of churches, the first factories and brickworks settled there. In 1784 the General Hospital was founded. In the 19th century the medical tradition of the later district was continued. While Franz Schubert was working in Alsergrund during the Biedermeier period , the St. Anna Children's Hospital and the “mental hospital” were built before 1848 . During the Vienna October Revolution of 1848, the area became a central battleground.
After the Alsergrund district was constituted in 1850, numerous new buildings were built and new building land was developed. The foundations for today's building fabric were laid during the time of the heyday . After the First World War , the Vienna community tried to alleviate the housing shortage by promoting residential construction; As everywhere in Vienna, numerous community buildings were built in Alsergrund .
The Alsergrund was spared the fighting during the civil war in 1934 . The dictatorship of the National Socialists initially affected primarily Jewish Viennese. Until then, they made up around 25% of the district population at times, as many Jewish doctors had settled not far from the hospitals. They were gradually driven out or murdered.
Towards the end of the Second World War , parts of the district were destroyed by air raids or ground fighting. The beginning of the Second Republic was marked by reconstruction and renewed housing construction. In politics, the SPÖ and ÖVP alternated time and again as the party with the strongest votes in the district. Since the district council elections in 2005, the Greens have been the second strongest party ahead of the ÖVP.
Roman times
During the Roman era , the Limes ran along the Währinger Strasse - Boltzmanngasse - Alserbachstrasse - Nussdorfer Strasse line through what is now the district. Behind it the military road led up the Danube to Asturis ( Klosterneuburg ). Remnants of the street were excavated in 1901–1904 at the beginning of Währinger Straße, the foundation walls of a Limes tower were discovered in the area of Bauernfeldgasse - Pokornygasse - Heiligenstädter Straße . Remnants of the wall from the suburb of the camp were also exposed in 1959/60 at the intersection of Währinger Strasse and Maria-Theresien-Strasse . Several votive stones and altars were also found along the Limes Road. The dead in the suburb of the camp were buried at the site of the Votive Church Park, where grave goods were exposed several times.
The Alsergrund in the Middle Ages
The Alsergrund in the early Middle Ages
The first isolated settlements on the Alsergrund were made around the year 800 by Bavarian colonists. Church settlements were built along the Limes, in the case of the Alsergrund, St. Johann an der Als . After the destruction of the Ostmark by the Hungarians , the battle on the Lechfeld in 955 brought about the turning point and the Babenbergs rebuilt the Ostmark from 976 onwards. A courtyard of the Benedictine Abbey of St. Michael zu Beuern stood in parts of the district . This “Hof zu Wahring”, mentioned for the first time in 1072, lay between Als and Währinger Bach and comprised vineyards , meadows and forest areas. The Michelbeuern district later developed from this area .
The Alsergrund in the High Middle Ages
In the High Middle Ages , Vienna also benefited as a transit station for various crusades . St. Johann an der Als, originally founded as a hospice for strangers, was probably already partially used as a hospital at that time. In 1179 a hospital was established to accommodate people suffering from leprosy . The name St. Johann an der Siechenals was subsequently transferred to the adjacent part of the Als and the neighboring settlement on the brook ( Siechenals ). The associated church stood on a hill to the right of the Als, today's Arne-Karlsson-Park , until 1858 . Heinrich II. Jasomirgott , founder of the Schottenstift transferred the property and the parish rights to the Schottenkloster in 1158 from Tiefen Graben to the Church of St. Johann and from there to the confluence of the Als and the Danube . The cultivation of vineyards at the "Schottenpoint", a steeply sloping bank of the Danube in the area of today's Währinger Strasse / Boltzmanngasse / Alserbachstrasse, was the main livelihood of Viennese citizens at that time.
The Alsergrund in the late Middle Ages
In 1255, the church of St. Johann im Werd was first mentioned in a papal bull . It belonged to a fishing village that was on the Danube Canal between the city wall and today's Berggasse am Oberen Werd . Werd or Wert was the Middle High German name for an island, with the Roßau as a demarcation to Leopoldstadt ( Unteres Werd ) was called Oberes Werd . Because of the abundance of fish and game in the area, ownership of the estate was in great demand. When Heinrich von Liechtenstein wanted to dispute the ownership of the Upper Werd and the Kahlenberg with the Klosterneuburg monastery , a papal bull in 1253 confirmed the monastery ownership. While the Lichtensteins returned the Kahlenberg, the Obere Werd and the later Lichtental remained separate.
On Schottenpoint the Maria-Magdalen convent developed that 1239 was first mentioned in a document. Nearby, at the beginning of the 13th century, at the beginning of today's Liechtensteinstrasse, was the Neuburgerhof (Klosterneuburger Hof), which was owned by the Klosterneuburg Monastery. Loess , which was baked into bricks in the numerous brick kilns , was mined very close to the Schottentor . One of these ovens started a major fire in 1276 that destroyed the entire city of Vienna with the exception of 150 houses. The village on Oberen Werd was rebuilt and incorporated into an Augustinian monastery . This moved to Augustinerstrasse in 1327 , whereupon the abandoned building was converted into a hospital. However, the hospital was unsuccessful and it was closed. In 1360 the Carmelites took over the building, but also moved to the city and built a church at Am Hof . The church of the so-called fishing suburb , however, continued to exist as the parish church of the village. The village lived mainly from fishing, which was carried out in the arms of the Danube, its oxbow lakes and a stream that originated at the Schottenpoint and flowed through today's Berggasse.
In the late Middle Ages, more and more people settled around the city of Vienna and lived in the settlements known as " Lucken ". However, the uncertain times, triggered by bands of robbers and marauding soldiers, made security necessary. Therefore, in the 15th century, bulwarks were built that were connected to the so-called city fence. For this purpose, trees were driven into the ground, connected with branches and secured with a thorn barn. The residents were responsible for repairs and defense. However, the local population was powerless against the coming developments. In 1477 the Hungarian king Matthias Corvinus besieged Vienna for the first time and occupied the Upper and Lower Werd. In 1485 he pitched his camp between the Schottentor and the Döblinger Bach and besieged Vienna again, so that he could move into Vienna that same year.
The Alsergrund in modern times
16th Century
The siege by the Hungarian army had made the weaknesses of the city fence obvious. When the Turks under Suleyman II appeared in front of Vienna in 1529 , the outer defenses were abandoned and destroyed. The Maria Magdalena monastery, the Klosterneuburger Hof, the church of St. Johann im Werd, as well as the church and the hospital of Siechenals with the village of the same name were set on fire. As a theater of war, the Alsergrund remained a sideline, but the tomb of Count Niklas Salms , the organizer of the defense, who was previously buried in the collegiate church of the Dorothee monastery , is now in the Votive Church .
The surviving population of the more than 800 burned down houses from the suburbs now pushed into the city. To make room for them, the less environmentally friendly business was relocated outside of the city. In 1538, the ruins of the abandoned defenses in the district were demolished. Instead of the Maria Magdalena monastery, a vineyard was laid out and the now deserted areas were opened up by new, straightened road axes. While the village of Siechenals was no longer built, the city council decided in 1540 to build a new hospital and to rebuild the St. Johann church. A construction prohibition zone was introduced around the city and an initially 90 meter wide glacis was built for better defense . The medieval suburbs thus disappeared. On the Danube Canal in the mid-16th century settled glassworks , while emerged before the Schottentor the oldest botanical gardens in Vienna. At the imperial church in front of the Schottentor (today Altes AKH , courtyards 8 and 9), a large cemetery was again laid out in 1561, which was consecrated in 1576. The Protestant Viennese were subsequently buried here and were given their own department from 1598. A Jewish cemetery in the district was first mentioned in 1629 at Seegasse 9-11.
17th century
Increased settlement and the founding of monasteries
By expanding the glacis to a width of 300 paces, the suburbs in front of the city wall of Vienna lost further space. In the Alsergrund district, this affected the fishing village on the Danube Canal between Berggasse and the city walls and a palace belonging to the Schwarzenberg family , which had to be demolished. In addition to a small settlement in front of the city walls with the shooting range, the Roßau still had a strong character with ponds, watercourses and oxbow lakes that hindered settlement. Now, however, the establishment of second homes in this area became interesting for the nobles and rich citizens. In addition, more and more orders and monasteries settled in front of the city wall. In the course of the Counter Reformation in 1633 Benedictine monks (Black Spaniards) settled in the Alservorstadt . In 1633 the foundation stone for the monastery was laid in front of the Schottentor on the way to the former Protestant stronghold of Hernals . The Servite Order was also given permission to settle in the Roßau in 1638. Although the order was sponsored by patrons like Octavio Piccolomini , it was not until 1666 that the first service could be held. Other areas became gradually more populated. In the middle of the 17th century, the district area was only populated up to the lower reaches of the Als and built up with gardens loosened up. In 1646, 117 years after the destruction of Siechenals, the brick manufacturer Johann Thury erected a building in this area for the first time and promoted the Servite monastery. In the middle of the 18th century, the suburb that was emerging here was named Thurygrund after him .
The Alsergrund under the sign of the plague
The Alsergrund also became more and more important as a center for hospitals and infection houses. The old military hospital in today's Arne-Karlsson-Park , whose predecessor was the infirmary , comprised two buildings with the church in the middle. The Bäckenhäusel, which the city council rented as accommodation for doctors in 1650, was also located near the hospital. In addition, a convalescent home was created for the hospital and alternative quarters for the hospital. In the area of today's old AKH , the Kontumazhof was also built in 1657 , in which there were 124 rooms as well as a cemetery and a chapel, which was dedicated to the plague saint Rochus . If the farm was fully occupied, the suspects were isolated on the Spittelau . If there was no epidemic, the farm was given to tenants. However, when the plague was introduced from Hungary in 1678, all precautionary measures failed. By December 1679, around 64,000 people were buried in the district alone.
Four years later, the next catastrophe struck the place with the Second Turkish Siege of Vienna . When the Turks again stood in front of Vienna in 1683 , the now larger suburbs were set on fire by the defenders. From the Roßau , a firestorm also kindled, which cremated the Schottenstift and threatened an ammunition depot in the city. The district area, however, only remained on the edge of the war. While the Turkish troops destroyed the tombs of the Gottesackers, their Christian auxiliary troops quartered themselves in the burnt-out Servite Church. During the liberation, Margrave Ludwig von Baden and his Saxon dragoons finally advanced to the Schottentor.
reconstruction
In the wake of victory, numerous large buildings were built in the devastated suburbs of the district. Within a few years, three representative buildings were erected along Alser Strasse. First, the Lower Austrian Landscape Academy, a kind of aristocratic war school, was opened in 1688 on the site of today's Ostarrichi Park . In 1693, a large poor house , founded as a soldiers' hospital, followed, which was gradually expanded and in 1784 was converted into the general hospital (today the old general hospital ). As early as 1689, the Trinitarians (White Spaniards) began to build their monastery and a church, which was completed in 1702. Today, although it is no longer in the district, the Dreifaltigkeitskirche, as the later parish church of the Alservorstadt , looked after a large part of the district. The suburbs were also rebuilt much larger and more handsome. The line wall built in 1704 served as protection .
18th century
Emergence of the suburbs
After the destruction caused by the Turkish wars and the erection of the protective line wall, the suburbs were also included in the overall concept of Vienna for the first time at the turn of the century . Nobles built their palaces on the favorable grounds outside the city walls. In Alservorstadt, this mainly affected the southern part (now part of Josefstadt ), while the northern part developed into a center for sanatoriums and nursing homes. Gradual construction began in other parts of the Alsergrund as well. The landlords recognized the shortage of housing in Vienna, parceled out their fields and sold them to builders, especially craftsmen and landlords . They then built houses and took on renters to cover the high costs. The plague that broke out in 1713 only slowed growth for a short time.
Johann Adam Andreas Prince of Liechtenstein was in charge of this area . In 1687 he acquired Prince Auersperg's garden with neighboring meadows in the Roßau . On the southern part of the property, the prince built a large palace (today's Liechtenstein Museum ), and in the north he founded the Lichtental manor . In addition to a brewery founded in 1694 , the area there was released for construction from 1699, from which the suburb of Lichtental emerged. Another palace was built in 1693 for Count Christoph Johann von Althan . In 1685 the count had acquired a piece of land on which Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach built a "pleasure building" on the site of today's Franz-Josef-Bahnhof . However, his son sold the palace and the property to the Vienna City Administration in 1713. This released the area for settlement from 1724, after which the suburb of Althangrund developed.
Church building
A number of churches were also built at the beginning of the 18th century. After Charles VI. Having left Spain , numerous Spaniards had followed him to Vienna. To look after the Spaniards, a house of their own at Schottenpoint (today Boltzmanngasse) was bought, demolished and a special hospital was established on the property. After the Dreifaltigkeitsspital am Rennweg was closed , the Spanish Hospital took over the patients and was expanded in 1759. The church "Santa Maria de Mercede", which was built from 1722 to 1723 by Anton Ospel , also belonged to the hospital . In 1712 the foundation stone for the Lichtentaler parish church was laid, as the services for the residents of the new suburb of Lichtental had to be held in the neighboring brewery. The residents of the Thurygrund also received permission to build a chapel in 1713. There was initially no money for the Servite Church , which was damaged by the Turkish wars . Only from 1714 to 1716 could the towers be renovated after numerous collections. The Schwarzspanier monastery, which was destroyed in the Turkish War on Alser Straße, was no longer rebuilt in its original location, but at today's Schwarzspanierstraße 13. The foundation stone was laid in 1690, but the monastery and church continued to be completed by 1727.
Economic boom
The first manufactories also settled in the suburbs in the 18th century. In 1718 the first porcelain manufactory started in Roßau (Liechtensteinstrasse 43) , which passed into imperial ownership in 1744 and was able to expand rapidly as a result. In 1754 a calico factory was added opposite , which from 1777 also built wool sorting systems and spinning machines. In Lichtental, weaving was the most important trade in terms of numbers, as weavers who immigrated from 1740 in particular and operated linen, cotton and silk weaving. At Michelbeuern -, Himmelpfort - and the northern Thurygrund , however, there was the greatest density of brickworks in and around Vienna. Under Maria Theresa the district also developed into a center of silkworm breeding , in 1768 alone in the courtyards of the Grossarmenhaus there were 1,039 mulberry trees. In 1795 there was also an earthenware crockery factory on Alserbach (today Nussdorfer Straße 8-14), to which a factory for pens and crayons was attached. There were also several mills on the Als .
Floods, fires and explosions
Numerous floods in the district are recorded from the late 18th century. Presumably due to the increasing population in the vicinity of the Danube and Als , the damage also increased. In 1768 an ice rush on the Danube caused floods, and further floods occurred in 1770, 1771, 1784, 1785, 1786 and 1787. The area was hit particularly hard in 1786 when the Danube flooded the lower-lying suburbs of Althangrund , Lichtental and Roßau four times. On July 9, a major fire also destroyed 40 houses in Lichtental. On June 26, 1779, a powder magazine had exploded in today's Pulverturmgasse and badly damaged the surrounding suburbs, numerous houses had collapsed and about 70 people were killed.
The Alsergrund under Joseph II.
Some important structures in Alsergrund were completed under his mother Maria Theresa. The foundation stone for the Alser barracks was laid in 1751 at the site of the Lower Austrian State Academy, which was closed in 1749 . In 1758 the kk rifle factory was built in the immediate vicinity . Her son Emperor Joseph II also had the Imperial and Royal Military Garrison Main Hospital built on the site of the abandoned Kontumazhof (Van Swieten-Gasse) from 1783 to 1784, which offered space for 1,200 patients. The Josephinum was built in the immediate vicinity from 1783, where doctors for the military were initially trained. After a visit to the Grossarmenhaus in 1783, Joseph II also ordered the abolition of the facility and reopened the facility in 1784 as the "General Hospital" ( Old General Hospital ).
The church reform and the abolition of numerous monasteries also made themselves felt on the Alsergrund. On July 16, 1783, the monastery of the Benedictines of Montserrat ( Black Spaniards ) was abolished, who had refused to take over the pastoral care of the General Hospital. The church was profaned in 1787, the damaged tower removed and the furnishings scattered to the wind. The church was converted into the kk military bed store, the monastery was sold and used as an apartment building. On November 21, 1783, the Trinitarians' monastery was also closed . The monastery, church and the parish Alservorstadt were taken over by the Minorites . The Servites also lost foundation capital worth 100,000 guilders, including an apartment building and vineyards. However, the order was not canceled and the order church was raised to the parish church of Roßau. After the abbey of the Himmelspförtnerinnen in the inner city was dissolved, its manorial power became state property. For the area that was acquired by the city of Vienna in 1824 and was originally called Sporkenbühel ("Sperlingshügel"), the name Himmelpfortgrund has now become established . In the spirit of Josephinism , the manorial power over an area of 71 yoke from Michaelbeuern Abbey was also sold to the City of Vienna. The term Michelbeuerngrund later became established for the area with then twelve subjects . The numerous brotherhoods were also dissolved and their assets added to the religious fund. When Joseph II ordered the dissolution of the cemeteries within the line wall, the cemeteries within the district that had to be buried at the General Währinger local cemetery (today Währingerpark ) also disappeared . The Christian cemeteries were built on or were kept as green spaces, only the Jewish cemetery Roßau in Seegasse remained until 1942. With the abolition of the death penalty, the place of execution in Roßau became obsolete.
19th century
The Alsergrund in Biedermeier
The Napoleonic Wars did not leave their mark on the Alsergrund either. After the occupation of Vienna in 1805, fires broke out in two places in Roßau at the same time, the origin of which was blamed on the occupiers. After the battle of Aspern and Eßling in 1809, more than 200 wounded and sick soldiers were quartered in the Servite monastery. The conditions sparked an epidemic that also killed eight priests. The constant threat from the French also caused major financial losses due to war contributions , taxes and currency devaluation . The porcelain manufactory also suffered badly and did not recover until 1815. The Biedermeier era followed the Congress of Vienna , with Franz Schubert, who was born here, playing a particularly prominent role in the Alsergrund . In addition to the Metternic surveillance state, the Biedermeier attitude towards life also included the pleasures in the inns, in which Joseph Lanner and Johann Strauss (father) played in particular . The number of restaurants was high, in Lichtental the share of restaurants in the total number of houses was ten percent and in Roßau inns attracted boatmen and travelers from various guilds . In the Lazarettgasse 14 to 20, the Brünnlbad developed , which was fed by a healing spring. Even outside of the line wall, which became a tax limit for food, numerous restaurants were built due to the low price level. During the Biedermeier period, however, a number of large projects were again implemented in the district. A modern children's hospital ( St. Anna Children's Hospital ) was completed just before the revolution in 1848 and the construction of the mental hospital on the Brünnlfeld was approved. The most important project, however, was the vaulting of the Als between the mouth and the line wall, which was carried out between 1840 and 1846. The construction of the Michelbeuerngrund , where 26 new houses and factories were built between 1800 and 1845, and the parceling of the former Servite Garden in the Alservorstadt made this step necessary. In addition to the protection against floods, the reason was also the hygienic conditions, as wastewater was discharged into the Als and rubbish was thrown that the river could no longer remove. Since the heavy building activity also lowered the water table, the Kaiser-Ferdinand-Wasserleitung was built from 1836 onwards . During the Biedermeier period, Roßau developed into one of the most important centers of car manufacturing and saddlery , and numerous book printers and typesetters settled in Alservorstadt . But even during this time, the district area was not spared disasters. In the winter of 1829/30, a massive ice rush in the Danube or Danube Canal claimed 25 lives in the district.
The Alsergrund was also the seat of the first commercial gasworks in Vienna, the Roßau gasworks .
The revolution of 1848
While the craftsmen lost more and more of their independence through mass production in large-scale industry, numerous farmers migrated to the cities due to their oppressive living conditions. Since the bourgeois industry could not take in the masses, they migrated to factories. About half of the factory workers were women and children who suffered from 12 to 13 hour hours. However, due to the state environment and the low-consumption population, industry also lacked the strength to increase investments. The dependency of the working class ultimately led to the formation of numerous slums around Vienna, including the Lichtental and the Thurygrund in the first place . An economic crisis that hit all of Europe from 1847 made the situation even worse, food prices rose and crime increased. In order to alleviate the misery somewhat, Franz Romeo Seligmann, professor at the medical faculty, initiated a feeding of the poor, which took place in the poor supply house in Lazarettgasse from 1847. After the famine winter of 1847/48, the bourgeois March Revolution finally took place , which was quickly followed by students and workers. After the military was able to prevent a broad penetration of the revolutionaries and Metternich had fled, the government made several concessions. So the tax on food was lowered and a work program for the unemployed was created, in the course of which the Währinger Strasse was re-routed to the line wall . When Viennese soldiers were called in to suppress the Hungarian uprising in October, the masses prevented the soldiers from marching out and lynched the Minister of War ( Vienna October Revolution ). The imperial troops under Alfred I. Prince of Windisch-Graetz used the incident to finally put down the revolutionary tendencies. out. They included Vienna, with the decisive battles occurring particularly on the Nussdorf line. While fighters from here repeatedly tried to fail and kept the engine house of the Kaiser-Ferdinand-Wasserleitung occupied, imperial artillery from Oberdöbling fired from the wall. This also caused severe damage to houses in Lichtental and Spittelau. On the night of October 29, the imperial troops finally climbed the deserted wall and stormed the inner city two days later.
The incorporation of the Alsergrund area into Vienna
After the decision to incorporate the 34 suburbs of Vienna had already been made in 1848, the incorporation de jure was put into effect in 1850 by the signature of Emperor Franz Joseph I under the "provisional municipal code". The previously densely built-up area between the city wall and line wall came to Vienna. The area of the Alsergrund was initially incorporated into Vienna as the 8th district and included the suburbs Althangrund , Himmelpfortgrund , Lichtental, Michelbeuern , Rossau and Thurygrund. Then there was the Alservorstadt, also known as Alsergrund, which, as the largest suburb, gave the new district its name. However, the southern part of Alservorstadt was separated and added to the Josefstadt district. After the Wieden district was created in 1861 by separating it from Margareten , the former 8th district became today's 9th district of Alsergrund. At the time of incorporation, the Alsergrund area was still very differently built-up. While the Althangrund was still almost undeveloped, the Alservorstadt was dominated by numerous public buildings. The Himmelpfortgrund and Lichtental had already reached their structural limits, whereas the Michelbeuerngrund was shaped by the state insane asylum and the Sigl factory. The Roßau still had a high proportion of green areas and the Thurygrund was already densely built. There was unobstructed space in particular between Spital- and Porzellangasse and in the peripheral areas such as the flood-threatened Danube route between Augasse, Althanstrasse, Porzellangasse and Danube Canal.
By combining the seven suburbs, the confusion of borders between the various manors disappeared at one stroke. Furthermore, a social melting pot was formed. So the inhabitants of the doctors district of Alservorstadt, the brick workers of Michelbeuerngrundes that Strobler of Althangrundes, the woodworkers of Roßau that were scrubber girl of Himmelpfort reason, the Lichtentaler craftsmen and Thurygrunder day laborers to residents of Alser ground and thus to Viennese. Then there were the Slovaks from Krowotendörfels and the Jews from Roßau. In addition, however, the residents maintained a partly pronounced local patriotism for a long time and remained connected to their part of the district.
The redesign of the district area
To standardize the streets in Vienna , there were eight (!) Church streets in the seven Alsergrund districts alone, and numerous streets in the new districts had to be renamed. In addition, the houses were numbered aisle for the first time after there had been a consecutive numbering and house names. For better orientation, angular street signs pointed to the inner city, oval ones around it. A brochure was also issued with the old and new names.
Important development areas in the new district were the previous construction prohibition zones of the glacis and the line wall. To finance the Franz-Josephs-Kaserne Vienna and the arsenal , the state sold a strip of the Roßauer Glacis. In 1854 and 1859, large residential buildings such as Palais Schlick and Palais Festetics were built on 71 building sites between Berggasse and Türkenstrasse . In 1861 the provisional parliament building was also built at the beginning of Währinger Straße. The construction of the Votive Church, which began in 1856, also allowed the Alsergrund district to grow closer and closer to the inner city. The Rossau barracks , built from 1865, dominated the Roßau district. In 1871, the municipal district office was finally built at Währinger Straße 43 instead of the kk clothing depot. It had previously been temporarily housed in a neighboring house.
Other important buildings were the switchboard at Berggasse 35 and the police building with the prison on the then Elisabethpromenade / corner of Berggasse. The development of the district area on the Danube Canal did not take place until after the turn of the century. The Spittelauer Platz with numerous Art Nouveau buildings was built next to the Franz-Josefs-Bahnhof . The then Elisabeth promenade on the Danube Canal (today Rossauer Lände ) was provided with representative buildings and refined with the Rossauer fountain. The Nussdorfer Strasse market hall was built to improve local supply .
The founding period (around 1850 to 1914) led to a fundamental change in the building fabric on Alsergrund. In the early founding period until 1870, people were content with making better use of the available space by adding storeys or building courtyards and gardens. The majority of the building stock in the district, however, comes from the time of the Hochgründerzeit (1870 to 1890). Numerous prestigious buildings such as rental palaces and luxury apartment buildings for the upper class were built near the Ringstrasse.
Towards the Gürtel, however, the district area was built with rental houses of the Bassena type. These workers' houses differed less from the houses of the upper class in the exterior design than in the use of space. For example, the workers' houses lacked the vestibule and the apartments were reached via the hallway with the shared water connection ( Bassena ) and the shared toilets. The small and very small apartments are entered through the kitchen. Poor people also had to share their apartments with subtenants or bed-goers . Due to the poor hygienic conditions and the high population density, tuberculosis was also rampant in the district area.
20th century
In 1905 there was a small change in the district area at the Gürtel. Until then, the border between the 9th and 18th districts from Währinger Straße to the north had not run along the Gürtel, but one block further east through Lustkandlgasse, so that today's Volksoper belonged to the 18th district. A provincial law passed at the end of 1904 and a proclamation published by the kk Lower Austrian governor on June 7, 1905 resulted in the relocation of the district boundary to the western edge of the tram route.
The first republic
At the end of the First World War , the Communist Party of Austria was founded and moved into its headquarters in Alsergrund at Pulverturmgasse 7. In mid-June 1919, 20 machine guns were confiscated by the police from the party headquarters. In addition, 100 party officials were arrested and imprisoned in the Rossauer Lände police prison. A demonstration that was triggered by this was forcibly broken up by the Republican Guard at Hörlgasse 6, killing 20 people. Further unrest broke out, which only ended when the prisoners were released. In the early 20s, the ongoing inflation of money led to massive impoverishment of the population. The rehabilitation of the currency with the help of the League of Nations, in turn, triggered mass unemployment. In order to protect the children from impoverishment, the municipality of Vienna set up the child transfer point at Lustkandlgasse 50 , which accepted children due to homelessness, neglect or endangerment from their parents. As early as 1926, the facility was looking after 3,324 children and within about three weeks referred them to other facilities or people. The City of Vienna also tried to alleviate the hardship by building inexpensive municipal housing and financed this measure by introducing a housing tax . In the Alsergrund, vacant lots were built or worn out small houses were demolished and replaced by large community buildings. The first residential complex to be built was a community building at Rögnergasse 6. This was followed by the Gall-Hof between 1924 and 1925, the Sigmund-Freud Hof (Heiligenstädter Straße 4) in 1924, the Wagner-Jauregg-Hof (Gussenbauergasse 5-7) and a residential complex in 1927 in Lustkandelgasse 26–28. However, the Thuryhof in Thurygasse 11, which has been provided with 105 apartments and a kindergarten, is a prime example of municipal housing. In 1933 a part of the so-called Hauser-Grunds was sold and the Rummelhardtgasse was rebuilt and provided with modern new buildings.
The district area was hardly affected by the Austrian civil war in 1934. Although the Republican Schutzbund planned to defend the area against home guards , the police and the military, these arrested the insurgent workers' leaders and prevented strikes in the central energy supply units such as the Mariannengasse power station and the substation on the Währinger Gürtel. As a result, numerous arrested persons were imprisoned in the police prison on the Roßauer Lände and later partly transferred to the detention camp in Wöllersdorf . In 1935 540 anti-fascists from the police prison went on hunger strike because of the poor prison conditions.
The Alsergrund under the National Socialists
After German troops marched into Austria on March 12, 1938, Adolf Hitler had the completed “ Anschluss ” of Austria to the German Reich approved by a subsequent referendum. In the elections on April 10, only 58 percent of the district residents in Alsergrund from 1934 were eligible to vote. 11,000 Jews and "politically unreliable" were excluded from participation. According to official information, 99.5% of the 48,410 eligible voters ultimately voted for the “connection”.
The takeover of power by the National Socialists led to a change in numerous ownership structures in the district. The Polyclinic and the General Hospital became the property of the City of Vienna, and the St. Anna Children's Hospital was incorporated into the administration of the German Red Cross . In the Wasagymnasium, the district administration of Niederdonau was also housed, as they did not want to reside in the district capital Krems . The traffic has also been completely changed. In 1938, the right-hand driving rules were introduced and all trams were converted overnight. Massive discrimination and persecution of the Jewish population began overnight. The (Jewish) Sanatorium Loew was closed, the Jewish director of the AKH, Otto Glaser, was relieved of his office, as were his Jewish medical colleagues. The community synagogue on Müllnergasse was set on fire by an SS troop during the November pogrom in 1938 . Whereas in 1923 25.10% of the district population (23,746 people) and in 1934 23.3% (around 19,400 people) had committed themselves to Judaism, on October 1, 1939 only 12,191 Jews were registered in the district area and the neighboring Josefstadt. In 1943 only 7242 people of the Mosaic faith remained in the Alsergrund. The majority of them were subsequently murdered in the National Socialist concentration camps.
To defend buildings that were important to the war effort, stands for light flak were erected above the Franz-Josefs-Bahnhof , the Michelbeuern substation, the National Bank and the bridges over the Danube Canal . In addition, extensive air raid bunkers were created. An originally planned in the Rossau Barracks Flakturm however, was never built. Despite all preparations, the destruction caused by the Allied air raids was great. The areas around the St. Anna Children's Hospital, the area between Säulengasse and Sechsschimmelgasse and the area between Schottenring and Berggasse were hit hardest on the Alsergrund. The Roßauer barracks and the Franz-Josefs-Bahnhof were also affected by the ground fighting in 1945. In total, 560 of around 1,000 houses were damaged and 1,491 apartments made unusable. The first Allied troops of the Red Army reached the district area on April 8, 1945 at around 6 p.m. at the so-called madhouse garden. However, the advance to the Danube Canal was stopped by the German Wehrmacht and the bitter fighting continued until April 10th. Then the German troops withdrew across the Danube Canal. The artillery duels destroyed buildings along the Roßauer Lände until April 12th.
The second republic
The Alsergrund came under the administration of the United States Forces of Austria according to an agreement of the Allies of September 1, 1945. The Franz-Josefs-Bahnhof and a small field airport on the Spittelauer Lände served to supply the occupation zone . However, the supply situation was initially catastrophic, and between October 1945 and May 1946 it fell from 1,500 to 1,000 kcal. The October figure of the previous year was not reached again until November. In addition to supplying the district population, the greatest attention was paid to reconstruction. The reconstruction was financed by the housing reconstruction fund through long-term loans. From 1954, residential construction was additionally promoted by the Housing Promotion Act. In addition to municipal housing, the construction of owner-occupied and cooperative apartments was also supported. In 1962, the reconstruction of Lichtental began. For this purpose, low old buildings were demolished and the properties combined with vacant lots to form larger residential units. Numerous community buildings were erected, as well as green spaces and the Lichtentaler Park.
From a political point of view, the Alsergrund district was subject to constant change. The party with the strongest votes was alternately the SPÖ and the ÖVP , although the two parties were usually only able to maintain their relative majority for between one and two periods until 1978. Only between 1978 and 1991 was the ÖVP able to establish itself as the strongest party over three periods. However, since 1991 the SPÖ has been the district chairman without interruption , and in 2005 the ÖVP was replaced as the second largest party by the Greens .
literature
- Alfred Wolf : Alsergrund Chronicle. From Roman times to the end of the monarchy. Self-published, Vienna 1981.
- ders .: Alsergrund. District of Poets and Thinkers. Mohl, Vienna 1993, ISBN 3-900272-48-4 .
Web links
- District Museum Alsergrund
- Chronology of the district history ( Memento from September 29, 2007 in the Internet Archive )
