Bank for Thuringia

The building of the bank for Thuringia in Meiningen, built in 1909

The Bank für Thüringen AG was a banking house in Meiningen , the former capital and residence of the Duchy of Saxony-Meiningen . The listed bank building is now used as a commercial building under the name "Altesgericht".

history

Predecessor until 1909

The bank for Thuringia emerged from the private banking house BM Strupp , which was founded in Meiningen in 1742. On October 18, 1905, the brothers and owners Gustav Strupp , Meinhard Strupp († 1912) and Louis Strupp († 1914) converted the bank with a share capital of 10 million marks into the Aktiengesellschaft Bank für Thüringen . Gustav Strupp became chairman of the supervisory board . In the years 1906 to 1910 the Strupps had a large, representative bank building and the equally impressive Strupp villa built as a company and residence. The brothers also sat on around 30 supervisory boards and appeared with above-average social commitment.

The business area of ​​the Bank für Thüringen mainly related to the crediting of industrial companies, especially in the porcelain industry , the electrical industry , the textile industry and in railway construction. In 1912, Strupp appointed the banker Ludwig Fuld as director of the bank, who continued to run the bank after Gustav Strupp's death in 1918. The Bank für Thüringen developed into the most important regional bank in the Thuringian region and in 1926 had a total of 27 branches in all major cities with around 300 employees and assets of 200 million Reichsmarks . It was one of the 25 largest banks in Germany. The bank for Thuringia was finally taken over by the Berliner Disconto-Gesellschaft in 1926 and Ludwig Fuld was appointed First Director of the Süddeutsche Disconto-Gesellschaft in Mannheim . Disconto-Gesellschaft merged with Deutsche Bank AG in 1929 , which then had a branch in the Meiningen bank building until 1946. Ludwig Fuld had to leave Deutsche Bank AG in 1936 because of his Jewish origins. The files of the Bank for Thuringia were kept by Deutsche Bank AG, taken over in 1948 by Landesbank Thuringia and then by the State Bank of the GDR . In 1993 the Kreditanstalt für Wiederaufbau handed over the bank's files to the Thuringian State Archives in Meiningen .

Building

East side gable

In 1905, the bank for Thuringia first moved into the "Wagnersche Haus" building of the Mitteldeutsche Creditbank, which had previously been based in Meiningen and relocated to Frankfurt am Main , on Leipziger Strasse directly on the Werra and Volkshausbrücke. On February 1, 1909, the bank moved into a dominant new building in the neo-baroque style , designed by the architect Karl Behlert , in place of the old building .

The three-storey house has an inner courtyard and a mansard roof . A wide, curved staircase leads to the main portal on the east side. The Meiningen city coat of arms is attached above the portal, which is flanked by two pillars and has a canopy. All four facades are provided with reliefs, pilasters and columns as well as balconies on the first floor, on the west side also on the second floor. The capitals of the columns and the portal arch are adorned with friendly female heads. The richly decorated facades on the north, east and south sides are crowned by column-supported gables, with round windows framed by decorative elements in the tympanum fields. In the gable on the east side the sculptures of a girl and a boy hold a festoon . A hall building is attached to the northwest corner. Above the windows of the first floor, in addition to the coat of arms of the city of Meiningen, attached above the main portal, the stone coats of arms of some of the cities in which the bank was located, as well as those that gave Meiningen special support in the reconstruction after the great city ​​fire of 1874. They are the coats of arms of the cities of Frankfurt am Main as the new location of Mitteldeutsche Creditbank, Berlin , Leipzig , Apolda , Saalfeld , Sonneberg , Jena , Eisenach , Gotha , Salzungen and Hildburghausen . Further coat of arms fields were prepared, but were never implemented, especially since these were not sufficient for the large number of branches.

Coat of arms east side portal

Coat of arms east side right

Coat of arms east side left

Coat of arms south side

Coat of arms north side

From 1946 to 2001 the house was, among other things, the seat of the Meiningen Regional Court , which between 1952 and 1990 was called the Suhl District Court - Meiningen headquarters . After the regional court moved to the newly built Meiningen Justice Center , the Thuringian Property Office moved in here for a short time . After a few years of vacancy, the Free State of Thuringia sold the listed building in 2017. After extensive renovation, it has since been used as an office building, event location and on one floor as a medical care center (MVZ) under the new official name “Altesgericht” .

literature

• Kuratorium Meiningen (Hrsg.): Lexicon for the history of the city of Meiningen. Bielsteinverlag, Meiningen 2008, ISBN 978-3-98095044-2 .
• Meininger Mediengesellschaft mbH : Meininger Heimat-Klänge. Edition 2008.

Web links

Commons : Bank für Thüringen Meiningen  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• insuedthueringen.de Financial institute, court - now commercial building.
• Archive portal Thuringia Stock of the Bank for Thuringia in Meiningen.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Kuratorium Meiningen (ed.): Lexicon for the history of the city of Meiningen. Bielsteinverlag, Meiningen 2008, page 26.
2. ↑ thueringen.de History of the Meiningen Regional Court.

Coordinates: 50 ° 34 '27.6 "  N , 10 ° 24' 55.7"  E