Lorenz Hagenbeck

Lorenz Amandus Gottfried Hagenbeck (born April 2, 1882 in Hamburg ; † February 26, 1956 there ) was a German zoo and circus director .

Live and act

Lorenz Hagenbeck was the second oldest son of Carl Hagenbeck . He attended secondary school, completed a commercial apprenticeship and worked in his father's company from October 1902. In 1903 he traveled to India , where he bought elephants. In March 1904, he and his older brother Heinrich Hagenbeck visited the Louisiana Purchase Exposition . The brothers showed the "Carl Hagenbeck's trained animal show". They then toured the USA and performed the dressage tests shown during the world exhibition again. In 1910, the celebration of the centenary of Argentina took place in Buenos Aires . Lorenz Hagenbeck designed the "Exposicón Carlos Hagenbeck" for this, in which he combined a national show and circus acts.

Pillow stone for Lorenz Hagenbeck (bottom right) on the family grave cemetery Ohlsdorf

Carl Hagenbeck died in April 1914. Lorenz Hagenbeck and his brother continued to run the business in which they had had an equal share since 1911. During the First World War , the zoo ran into financial problems. Lorenz Hagenbeck bought a circus from Adolf Straßburger in March 1916. With this he toured through Norway, Denmark, Poland and the Netherlands in order to earn additional money. Lorenz Hagenbeck himself led an elephant group. After the end of the war, the circus named after Carl Hagenbeck performed in Essen from February 1919 and in Vienna from December 1923 . The demonstrations took place in permanent houses. In the following period the circus went on tour through various European countries. In 1927/28 and 1936/37 the circus gave performances in South Africa. From April 1933 to December 1934 a "world tour" led to Japan, China, India and Egypt. The circus was thus the first Western European, professionally operated circus that found its way to these countries.

During the Second World War , the circus moved into winter quarters in Stellingen in the winter of 1943 . The winter quarters were destroyed, as was the circus building in Vienna in November 1944. At the end of the war, dressage groups and circus items were in Sweden, where they were confiscated, expropriated and auctioned off in 1947. Lorenz Hagenbeck tried to organize a new circus. From 1949 to 1953 his son Erich Hagenbeck and his nephew Fritz Wegner managed the new company, which in addition to appearing in Germany, also appeared in Switzerland and Belgium. However, the circus was not economically successful and was therefore shut down by Lorenz Hagenbeck at the end of 1953.

Lorenz Hagenbeck died in early 1956 after a long illness, he was buried in the family grave site, Ohlsdorf cemetery in Hamburg, grid square AE 15 (north of Nordteich ).

literature

• Klaus Gille: Hagenbeck, Lorenz . In: Franklin Kopitzsch, Dirk Brietzke (Hrsg.): Hamburgische Biographie . tape 2 . Christians, Hamburg 2003, ISBN 3-7672-1366-4 , pp. 171 .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Celebrity Graves