Abraham Wertheim
Abraham (Adolf) Wertheim (born November 18, 1819 in Anklam ; † July 3, 1891 in Seelisberg / Switzerland ) was a Jewish-German merchant. He was the founder and namesake of the Wertheim department store group .
biography
Anklam
Abraham was the son of the merchant Joseph Cohn from the Hanseatic city of Salzwedel . Joseph and his brother Joel Cohn were the first to use the Wertheim family name. At the end of 1817, the Wertheim brothers moved to the Pomeranian Hanseatic city of Anklam and opened a small shop at Steinstrasse 2, near the market. When they arrived, 33 Jews were already living in Anklam, including the textile merchant Bär Teppich, who was related by marriage and who owned a shop in a four-story gabled house on Markt 9.
On November 18, 1819, Freide Wertheim gave birth to their fourth child, Abraham. Abraham attended the city school on Schulstrasse. After reaching the age of 22, the father sent Abraham and his younger brother Theodor to an apprenticeship in Victorian England, which was experiencing a capitalist boom. Ten years later, in 1851, the brothers returned to Anklam for the funeral of their grandfather Lewin Cohn and settled in the Hanseatic city of Stralsund in New Western Pomerania .
Stralsund
On April 15, 1852, the Wertheim brothers rented a shop in an apartment building on the harbor and opened a manufactory and fashion store. On market days there was a booth in the old market .
On April 17th, 1855, Abraham married Ida Wolff (born on January 22nd, 1830), the daughter of the respected textile dealer Wolf Loeser Wolff from Prenzlau in the Uckermark region . They had six sons and three daughters, including the second son Georg Wertheim . Georg went to the new capital of Berlin with his older brother Hugo to begin a commercial apprenticeship in his uncle's textile wholesaler ( Wolff & Apolant ) there on October 13, 1872 .
At the suggestion of their uncle and with the support of their two eldest sons, Abraham and Ida Wertheim opened the first Wertheim store on November 17, 1875 at Stralsunder Mühlenstrasse 50 , at the corner of Mönchstrasse , and the nucleus of the later group. The sales room was a separate room from the parents' apartment.
An equally innovative competition soon revived business in Stralsund. On August 14, 1879, the merchant Leonhard Tietz , coming from Frankfurt (Oder) , opened a “yarn, button, trimmings and woolen goods store in wholesaling and en-détail” at 31 Ossenreyerstraße . That was the hour of birth of the department store group Galeria Kaufhof .
As early as 1880 Abraham Wertheim was able to acquire a stately residential and commercial building at Mühlenstrasse 56 , near the Alter Markt . The Lord Mayor of Stralsund lived on the first floor. For the first time, the shop sign above the shop windows read in capital letters “A. Wertheim ".
On January 23, 1883, the first-born son Hugo died of tuberculosis at the age of 27 while on a vacation trip to Italy .
On April 1, 1883, the son Georg Wertheim opened the first branch of "A." in the Hanseatic and port city of Rostock . Wertheim ". The shop was located at Kröpeliner Straße 56, in the main shopping street of the historic old town.
Berlin
On October 1, 1885, Georg Wertheim expanded to Berlin and opened another branch at Rosenthaler Strasse 27 under the company name “A. Wertheim ". In the three-emperor year 1888 Abraham and Ida Wertheim also moved from Stralsund to Berlin, to the Tiergarten, Brückenallee 36. Abraham became a member of the Jewish reform community, which had its own temple in Johannisstrasse.
On March 31, 1890, the Wertheim brothers opened another small shop at Oranienstrasse 149/150 not far from Moritzplatz with the company sign “A. Wertheim ".
Abraham Wertheim died in 1891 during a vacation trip to Switzerland. He is buried in the Jewish cemetery in Berlin-Weißensee .
family
Abraham Wertheim left behind his widow Ida Wertheim, who fell ill and died of the Spanish flu on December 19, 1918 , as well as the children Georg, Wilhelm (1859–1934), Hedwig (1860–1921), Helene (1862–1941), Franz ( 1863–1933) and Wolff (1867–1940).
literature
- Erica Fischer, Simone Ladwig-Winters: The Wertheims. History of a family , non-fiction book with family tree table, Reinbek near Hamburg, May 2007, ISBN 978-3-499-62292-2 .
- Joachim Puttkammer: Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania - 100 famous heads , Sutton Verlag, Erfurt 2011, page 52.
Web links
- Friends of historic department stores Wertheim and Tietz in Stralsund e. V. Official website
- Chronicle 1875–2007: The Wertheim family and the dispute over their inheritance , Handelsblatt dated March 30, 2007.
Individual evidence
- ^ Nicole Kiesewetter: Department store culture in Stralsund: From the province to the world In: Schweriner Volkszeitung from November 13, 2018.
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Wertheim, Abraham |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Wertheim, Adolf |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Jewish-German merchant |
| DATE OF BIRTH | November 18, 1819 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Anklam |
| DATE OF DEATH | July 3, 1891 |
| Place of death | Seelisberg , Switzerland |