Adam Opel
Adam Opel (born May 9, 1837 in Rüsselsheim ; † September 8, 1895 there ) was a German entrepreneur, founder of the Opel company and founder of a separate branch of the Opel family .
Life
Adam Opel, eldest son of master locksmith Philipp Wilhelm Opel (1803–1867), began his professional career, like his brothers Georg and Wilhelm Opel, as an apprentice locksmith in his father's workshop. The years of traveling took him from 1857 via Belgium and England to Paris , where he worked in two sewing machine factories. Upon his return to his hometown, Opel in 1862 founded his own sewing machines manufactory . In 1884 his company was already producing 18,000 sewing machines a year. This laid the foundation stone for the Opel company.
On November 17, 1868, Opel married the innkeeper's daughter Sophie Marie Scheller . In 1886, Opel also started manufacturing bicycles . The Opel company quickly developed into Germany's largest bicycle manufacturer. After his death in 1895 as a result of typhoid fever , his widow Sophie Opel took over the business together with his five sons Carl (* 1869), Wilhelm (* 1871), Heinrich (* 1873), Fritz (* 1875) and Ludwig Opel (* 1880) Management of the company. Three years later, in 1899, the Opel family began producing automobiles . Wilhelm and Heinrich were finally raised to the nobility of the Grand Duke of Hesse in 1917 , Carl followed in 1918. Fritz and Ludwig remained civil.
Shortly before his death, Adam Opel is said to have exclaimed when he saw an automobile: “This stink box will never become more than a toy for millionaires who don't know how to throw away their money!” In February 1895 he actually bought a Benz Phaeton with 4 HP - delivered on March 14th, a few months before his death. Adam Opel is buried in the Opel mausoleum in Rüsselsheim am Main .
literature
- Hans Pohl: Adam Opel - Entrepreneur in the Age of Industrialization. On the 100th anniversary of Adam Opel’s death. Opel AG, Rüsselsheim 1995.
- Hans Christoph Graf von Seherr-Thoß: Opel, Adam. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 19, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1999, ISBN 3-428-00200-8 , p. 542 ( digitized version ). (there only genealogical information, the actual article text for all family members is in the online NDB under Opel, Friedrich Karl Adam Georg von )
Web links
- Literature by and about Adam Opel in the catalog of the German National Library
- Newspaper article about Adam Opel in the 20th century press kit of the ZBW - Leibniz Information Center for Economics .
- Opel, Adam from. Hessian biography. (As of January 14, 2011). In: Landesgeschichtliches Informationssystem Hessen (LAGIS).
- Adam Opel, German automobile pioneer in the ÖNB picture archive
Individual evidence
- ↑ see Hessisches Staatsarchiv Marburg (HStAMR), Best. 906 No. 441, p. 177 ( digitized version ).
- ↑ Opel, Adam von. Hessian biography. In: Landesgeschichtliches Informationssystem Hessen (LAGIS).
- ^ Sieger Heinzmann: The visual biography Adam Opel 1837–1895 - How it all began ; tredition GmbH, Hamburg. 2016. ISBN 978-3-7345-6237-2
- ↑ Opel Youth Calendar 1965 , p. 31.
- ↑ Joachim Stange: To stand still is to go backwards (= Opel - the first 40 years. Part 2). In: The reliable one. Club magazine of the ALT-OPEL IG from 1972 eV, No. 158 (2/2003), p. 4.
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Opel, Adam |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | German industrialist |
| DATE OF BIRTH | May 9, 1837 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Ruesselsheim |
| DATE OF DEATH | September 8, 1895 |
| Place of death | Ruesselsheim |