Adolf Cluss

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Adolf Cluss, 1900

Adolf Ludwig Cluss (born July 14, 1825 in Heilbronn ; † July 24, 1905 in Washington, DC , United States ) was a German-American architect . Until 1858 he belonged to the inner circle of the communists around Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels and after 1864 he became the most important architect in Washington.

Cluss came from the Heilbronn builder and industrialist family Cluss . He left his hometown in 1844 as a carpenter - journeyman at a young age. From 1846 onwards, Cluss worked as an architect in Mainz , where in April 1848 he was one of the founders of the workers' education association. He came into contact with Karl Marx in Brussels and joined the Union of the Just (since 1847 the Union of Communists ).

In the summer of 1848 he left Germany and landed in New York on September 15, 1848 on the Zurich emigrant ship . In the USA, Adolf Cluss initially worked as an engineer in Washington , mostly in the Navy , and from the early 1860s as an architect. In 1858 he broke off his ties to the communist movement - whose leader in the USA he was considered for some time.

In the decades from 1860 to 1890 he worked as a successful architect in Washington. He designed dozens of public buildings, including at least eleven schools, market halls, government buildings, museums and private houses. In 1872 he was an official city ​​engineer and a member of the public works committee. He was thus in charge of key work that changed the face of Washington in the 1870s: concreting roads, building a sewer system, and planting thousands of trees on the streets.

The Arts and Industries Building of the Smithsonian Institution made of typical Cluss red brick

His school buildings proved to be particularly influential, two of them still standing today: Franklin School and Sumner School , both in downtown Washington. He designed four major buildings on the National Mall , including the Arts and Industries Building of the Smithsonian Institution . Two market halls, Center Market and Eastern Market , are based on his designs. Eastern Market still serves as a covered market on Capitol Hill today .

He built private homes for the Washington elite. In 1880 he built Washington's first apartment building, Portland Flats , a six-story building with 39 apartments. Probably none of his private houses have survived; Portland Flats had to give way to an office building in 1962.

Because of his early political inclinations and because red brick was his preferred building material, the later staunch Republican was also known as the "red architect".

literature

  • Welta Nikolajewna Pospelowa: Adolf Cluss - a member of the League of Communists and comrade of Marx and Engels. In: Marx-Engels-Jahrbuch 3. Dietz Verlag, Berlin 1980, pp. 85-120. Digitized
  • Ehrenfried Galander: Marx and Cluss . In: Arbeitsblätter zur Wissenscghaftsgeschicht 11-Halle-wittenberg 1982, pp. 32–41.
  • Peter Wanner: Communist from the very beginning and builder of Washington - Adolf Cluss (1825–1905) . In: Christhard Schrenk (ed.): Heilbronner Köpfe. II. Life pictures from two centuries . Heilbronn, 1999, pp. 21-36. (= Small series of publications from the Heilbronn City Archives 45)
  • Adolf Cluss - revolutionary and architect. From Heilbronn to Washington . Edited by Alan Lessoff and Christian Mauch. Heilbronn 2005. ( Publications of the archive of the city of Heilbronn 46) ISBN 3-928990-92-6
  • Adolf Cluss and the gymnastics movement. From Heilbronn gymnastics festival in 1846 to American exile. Lectures at the symposium of the same name on October 28 and 29, 2005 in Heilbronn . Heilbronn 2007. (Small series of publications from the archive of the city of Heilbronn 54) ISBN 978-3-928990-97-4
  • Haila Ochs, Sabina Wiedenhoeft: Insight into American society. The letters of the architect Adolf Cluss . In: Jürgen Herres, Manfred Neuhaus (ed.): Political networks through letter communication. Letter culture of the political opposition movements and early labor movements in the 19th century . Akademie-Verlag, Berlin 2002, pp. 177–192. (Reports and treatises. Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences. Special volume) ISBN 3-05-003688-5

Web links

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personal data
SURNAME Cluss, Adolf
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Cluß, Adolph Ludwig (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German-American architect, member of the Union of the Just and the Union of Communists
DATE OF BIRTH July 14, 1825
PLACE OF BIRTH Heilbronn
DATE OF DEATH July 24, 1905
Place of death Washington, DC