Anton Poschacher (industrialist, 1812)

Anton Poschacher (* 1812 ; † 1873 ) was an Austrian industrialist who, from 1839, played a key role in the development of the Anton Poschacher granite works and the Mauthausner stone industry through the mining, processing and delivery of Mauthausner granite and, in 1873, for a short time the joint stock company for Roads and bridges with headquarters in Vienna as President.

Life

Anton Poschacher learned the trade of gingerbread maker and wax maker like his father and married Aloisia Kamptner (* 1813; † 1893) in 1839, the daughter of the wine merchant Kalkbrenners and quarry operator Leonhard Kamptner, who died in 1838 . The son of the two was Anton Poschacher (1841–1904).

His father was also called Anton (* 1789; † 1847) and was one of 27 children of a wealthy brewer and innkeeper family in Leogang near Lofer , who was married to Monika Huber (* 1788; † 1875) from Rotthalmünster in Lower Bavaria settled down as a Lebzelter in Mauthausen and was mayor there for several years (at that time it was more like market judge ).

Construction of the Anton Poschacher granite works

Although he was not a professional, he systematically expanded the business he had taken over from his father-in-law by purchasing quarries, forests and agricultural land, initially in Mauthausen and the surrounding area, and later also in Bohemia and Bavaria , and is considered the founder of the Anton Poschacher Granitwerke, which is an essential part of the Mauthausner Steinindustrie are to be seen.

The entrepreneur was also involved in hydraulic engineering on the Enns , Traun and Danube , where the delivery of armourstones was an ideal complement to the stone cube production (paving stones) and the stonemasonry business .

Around 1860 Poschacher employed several hundred workers in the quarries and had around twenty suppliers under contract. Most of the stones were transported by ship to Vienna, where u. a. the ring road was built. At the same time, competitors entered the market.

Expansion, collapse, new beginning

In 1870 Poschacher took part in the establishment of the "Actiengesellschaft für Straßen- und Brückenbauten", which was accompanied by the Bodencreditanstalt , based in Vienna . With the share capital of initially 1.8 million guilders, which was topped up by 900,000 guilders at the end of 1872, it was initially possible to acquire properties and companies belonging to the shareholders and other interested parties.

Poschacher was briefly president of the stock corporation. After his death in 1873, his son joined the company as a director, but was unable to come to an agreement with the company's executives about further, sometimes unprofitable, expansion plans, so he left the company and went on an extended journey to August 1876 America, where he visited the World's Fair in Philadelphia, USA, "on behalf of the high government" and worked as a reporter for architecture and public buildings.

As a result of the economic recession and strong expansion, the stock corporation was uneconomical and heavily indebted, so that liquidation had to be initiated in the end. After his return from America, Anton Poschacher (1841–1904) was able to buy the entire company in a lengthy process with family loans in 1876 and thus came into possession of the largest granite works in the Austro-Hungarian monarchy with more than a thousand employees.

literature

• History of Granitwerke Anton Poschacher
• Ernst Gusenbauer: In the quarry is a Leb´n - the rise and fall of the Mühlviertel stone industry using the example of Mauthausen (1870 to 1910) , in: Oberösterreichische Heimatblätter, Volume 44, Issue 4, Linz 1990, pp. 298ff, online (PDF) in the forum OoeGeschichte.at
• Poschacher family - indestructible like granite, in: OÖN from September 25, 2010 article

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Poschacher Firmenchronik, 1839 - 1989, page 2 ff and Poschacher A., ​​1939, page 6 ff
2. ↑ Josef Stummer: The history of the Perger granite quarries, in: Heimatbuch der Stadt Perg, Linz 2009, p. 427.