Gustav von Gemmingen-Guttenberg

Gustav Karl Wilhelm Ernst Freiherr von Gemmingen-Guttenberg (born October 20, 1897 at Guttenberg Castle ; † January 10, 1973 in Bretten ) was a farmer and forester at Guttenberg. He was the founder of tourism at Guttenberg Castle, one of the most important and best-preserved castles in the Neckar Valley. He founded the castle museum and the castle tavern and in 1971 enabled the German Greifenwarte to move into the castle.

Life

Grave of Gustav von Gemmingen-Guttenberg and his wife Thekla at the castle chapel of Guttenberg Castle

He came from the older Guttenberg branch of the Barons of Gemmingen and was the son of Eberhard von Gemmingen-Guttenberg (1862–1946) and Julie Freiin von Crailsheim (1869–1955). He attended high school in Heilbronn and in 1917 joined the Uhlan Regiment No. 17 in Ludwigsburg as a flag junior . In World War I he most recently served in Flanders . After the end of the war he studied agriculture and forestry in Hohenheim , Leipzig and Freiburg . In 1923 he took over the forestry business at Guttenberg Castle from his father, and a little later he founded the sawmill in Neckarmühlbach below the castle .

In 1929 he married Thekla von Polenz (1906–1994) in Langebrück near Dresden, who then took over the household at Guttenberg Castle and took care of the castle gardens. The marriage had the children Christoph (1930–1999), Friedegard (* 1932), Irmtraud (* 1934) and Rita (* 1937).

When the 500th anniversary of the Barons von Gemmingen was celebrated on Guttenberg in 1949, he set up a museum in the castle. In 1950, at his instigation, the castle tavern opened in the fountain house in front of the castle, which was expanded the following year. With the museum and the castle tavern, tourism began on the castle, which was never destroyed. In 1971 he enabled the German Greifenwarte to move in, which made the castle even more attractive for tourists and made it necessary to add a self-service restaurant to the castle tavern. His son Christoph (1930–1999) and his wife Gabriele von Gemmingen-Guttenberg continued the expansion and administration of the castle. The castle museum set up by Gustav von Gemmingen-Guttenberg was visited by around 80,000 visitors annually around 1990.

Gustav von Gemmingen-Guttenberg and his wife Thekla are buried in the castle cemetery by the castle chapel on Guttenberg.

literature

• Walter von Hueck: Lineage of the Barons von Gemmingen , special print from the Genealogical Handbook of the Adels Volume 37 (Freiherrliche Häuser A, Volume VI), CA Starke Verlag, Limburg an der Lahn 1966
• Maria Heitland: Family chronicle of the barons of Gemmingen. Continuation of the chronicles from 1895 and 1925/26 , Elztal 1991.