Old workshop (Geisenheim)

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The old factory in Geisenheim, view from the south with the stair towers

The old factory in Geisenheim am Rhein is a former production hall for various printing press manufacturers . Today it is under monument protection as an example of the Rhine-Main area as an important center of mechanical engineering . From here printing machines were delivered all over the world.

architecture

Interior view of the northern hall

Built from 1906 in a modern steel frame construction, the northern part of the hall was first built: the main facade with Art Nouveau ornaments was aligned with the north-facing railway. The southern part, which was structurally only slightly modified, followed by 1913 with the two flanking stair towers that followed. Inside, both halls were built in the traditional style of a basilica : the high central nave is flanked by two lower aisles. The central nave windows, which can almost be described as skylights due to the flat roof construction, should enable working with daylight. The architect of both halls and the stair towers was Georg Hartmann (1869–1956) from Geisenheim.

history

Beginnings in Johannisberg

Left: The northern hall, then the southern one

Johann Klein († 1896) and Johann Forst (1814–1879) initially ran a machine locksmith's shop in Klein's father's forge in Johannisberg-Grund , from which in 1846 a machine factory for printing machines was founded. The first high-speed press for the Wiesbaden Schellenberg'sche Hofdruckerei was delivered as early as the beginning of 1847 . In 1850, the businessman Johann Bohn joined the company as a partner, which from then on operated under the name Maschinenfabrik Klein, Forst & Bohn, Johannisberg . From then on, there was constant development, as a result of which machine halls and other workplaces were built in Johannisberg. Due to differences of opinion, Forst and Bohn left the company in 1871.

The thousandth high-speed press was delivered as early as 1875, and a factory health insurance scheme and an invalidity and pension fund were set up for the workers. Under the name Liliput , a small, modern commercial press was brought onto the market in 1876 , which quickly spread around the world. Another bestseller was the model R high-speed letterpress press .

Machine factory Johannisberg Geisenheim

Maschinenfabrik Johannisberg Geisenheim MJG Logo.png

In 1889, due to the increasing lack of space in the nearby Geisenheim, a 4-hectare site was acquired, conveniently located on the railway and country road, a first move in parts began in 1892. The company was now named Maschinenfabrik Johannisberg Klein, Forst, Bohn Successor in Geisenheim a . Rh. (MJG). The construction of the northern assembly hall began there from 1906, followed by the extension of the southern hall with the two subsequently built stair towers in 1913. By 1913, a modern factory site with workshops, model carpentry, forge, foundry and other buildings was built.

A first prototype of a new gravure printing machine based on the roll rotation principle was tested in 1911 at Deutsche Photogravur AG in Siegburg. For the first time, the printed sheets were not inserted into the machine individually by hand, but came off the roll. During the First World War , the workforce decreased significantly. 1915/16 a powerful, enhanced standard machine was FORWARD developed based on the "Lilliput" -Konstruktionspläne, from Lilliput even 2,345 units have been sold worldwide by the end of the war.

When the Second World War broke out in 1939, printing machine construction was initially banned; mobile machines with tractors and power units were only allowed to be built for the German Wehrmacht to print map material, so that new maps could be delivered daily to the front. Other military equipment such as machine tools of all kinds, but also aircraft accessories and grenades were manufactured over the next few years.

"My dear sister Rachela Nirenberg, victim of the Nazi labor camp in Geisenheim" (1922–1945). Tomb at the Jewish cemetery in Rüdesheim a. Rh.

In 1943, 25 Soviet prisoners of war were quartered in a company's own camp on the factory premises and posted to work. At the end of the year, part of the factory for the armaments company Friedrich Krupp AG Essen had to be cleared. This resulted in the Krupp-Essen war community and the Johannisberg machine factory .

In order to satisfy the steadily increasing need for armaments despite the shortage of workers caused by the war, a satellite camp of the Natzweiler-Struthof concentration camp was built on September 26, 1944 to the west of the company premises . On December 12, 1944, 200 female prisoners (mostly Polish Jews) came to Geisenheim via Bergen-Belsen and were housed there in barracks, where they were mainly supposed to manufacture closures for anti-aircraft guns. Shortly before the end of the war, the camp was evacuated on March 18, 1945 and the women were taken to the Dachau subcamp Allach near Munich .

After the end of the war, due to the allied occupation statute in 1946, part of the Fritz Werner production and the PREMAG company had to be started in the factory in Geisenheim. They took over the rooms that had become vacant as a result of the dissolution of the Friedrich-Krupp-AG .

On October 29, 1954, the Fritz-Werner-Manufacturing company was able to move to its own premises in the immediate vicinity, so that finally more space was available to meet the constantly growing demand for printing machines.

Miller Johannisberg

In 1954 there was a partial merger with the American printing machine manufacturer Miller Printing Machinery CO, Pittsburgh . At DRUPA 1962 , the newly developed high-performance letterpress machine Johannisberg 104 was presented, which was built in series for 19 years.

logo

In April 1968, the Fritz Werner Industrial Equipment company , which in the meantime belonged to the federally owned Deutsche Industrieanlagen GmbH (DIAG), took over the shares in the Johannisberg machine factory . The armaments supplier wanted to expand its own production; there was little interest in printing press production itself. This would have been disastrous for Miller Pittsburgh . By founding a 100% subsidiary Miller Johannisberg Druckmaschinen GmbH (MJD), a pure construction and sales company without its own production, Miller Pittsburgh wanted to preserve Geisenheim's know-how. Immediately afterwards, a cooperation agreement was signed with Fritz Werner for the production of printing machines. From then on, machines were built in Geisenheim under the name Maschinenfabrik Johannisberg and Miller Johannisberg , but development, research, construction and sales only took place under the name Miller Johannisberg . In 1972 Miller Johannisberg moved the company headquarters to Wiesbaden-Biebrich.

Left: The Miller Johannisberg office building built in 1988 . Right: Building of the old machine factory, demolished in 2012

On January 1, 1981, however, Fritz Werner Industrie-Ausätze also took over Miller Johannisberg Druckmaschinen GmbH . After Fritz Werner and his armaments business had come more and more into the focus of the public, attempts were made to switch production to civilian goods. With this step, Miller Johannisberg automatically came into the possession of DIAG.

1986 Miller Johannisberg achieved about half of the turnover of Fritz Werner GmbH . Due to the great success of Miller Johannisberg , the latter wanted to take care of the production itself again from 1987 onwards, and it became necessary to move back to Geisenheim. In 1989, after an old production hall was demolished, a new building was moved into which, in addition to office space, housed a modern large-scale printing center.

MAN Miller

MAN MILLER Druckmaschinen Geisenheim Logo.png

On December 20, 1989, DIAG was taken over by MAN AG and Miller Johannisberg was transferred to MAN Roland Druckmaschinen-AG . The company was renamed MAN Miller Druckmaschinen GmbH , which was intended to show that the Miller machines should be a complement and not a competition to the Roland machines. In addition, MAN Roland had the opportunity to use free production capacities in Geisenheim to build their own machines. The previous part of the company name Johannisberg was deleted.

In 2006 MAN Roland finally relocated the production facility to Offenbach am Main . This marked the end of a long mechanical engineering tradition in Geisenheim.

Todays situation

Since the printing press manufacturer left the hall, popularly known as the “Bahnhof Zoo”, which was still owned by MAN, a new use was sought. The conversation was u. a. a venue for the Rheingau Music Festival , but all efforts were initially in vain. In mid-2011, a demolition permit applied for by MAN was granted by the building supervisory authority of the Rheingau-Taunus district , but was not implemented.

Since December 2011, a plastics processing company has shown interest in the hall as a production location. At the beginning of 2012, the company acquired a 21,000 m² area from MAN including the listed hall, in which production is now taking place again.

literature

Web links

Commons : Maschinenfabrik Geisenheim  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Heitz Röder, Höhmann, Schirmbeck, Seidel Hesse; Monuments of industry and technology , Nicolai, Berlin 1986, ISBN 3875841751
  2. ^ Geisenheim, camp for Soviet prisoners of war. Topography of National Socialism in Hesse. In: Landesgeschichtliches Informationssystem Hessen (LAGIS).
  3. ^ Geisenheim, Geisenheim concentration camp external command, machine factory Johannisberg GmbH. Topography of National Socialism in Hesse. In: Landesgeschichtliches Informationssystem Hessen (LAGIS).
  4. ↑ Arms trade: agreement is considered secret DER SPIEGEL 19/1987
  5. ↑ Wiesbadener Tagblatt of October 8, 1988
  6. ↑ Johannes Bähr u. a .: " The MAN: a German industrial history ", CH Beck, Berlin, 3rd edition 2010, ISBN 978-3406577628 .
  7. ↑ Changed economic structure on the official website of the city of Geisenheim
  8. ^ "Bahnhof Zoo": demolition approved , Wiesbadener Kurier of July 6, 2011
  9. ↑ Industrial monument is revived , Wiesbadener Kurier from March 6, 2012

Coordinates: 49 ° 59 '20.48 "  N , 7 ° 58' 46.61"  O