Benger

The title of this article is ambiguous. Further meanings are listed under Benger (disambiguation) .

Benger is the name of a family of Huguenot descent, best known for their activities in the textile industry. Master stockiners from this family have been documented since the middle of the 18th century. In the 19th century, the artisan family business in Degerloch developed into a textile factory, which from 1874 in Stuttgart operated as Wilhelm Benger Söhne and later as Benger-Ribana , from 1963 to 1983 until bankruptcy in 1983 with its headquarters in Bad Rappenau . At times the company had international branches. The still existing Stuttgart fashion store Maute-Benger was founded by a Benger subsidiary, the Deuschle-Benger store in Amsterdam , which existed until 1987, by a Benger son-in-law.

Early craftsmen from the Benger family

Some members of the Benger Huguenot family left Alsace for religious reasons in the 17th century . The first descendant born outside Alsace was a Hans Benger, who was born in Gomaringen in 1655 . Perhaps his son Hans Martin, who was also born there in 1687, or his grandson Johannes Benger, born in 1722, settled in Degerloch. In 1750, Johannes Benger was named as a master of the hosiery trade . His son Johann Ludwig Josef Benger (* 1759), who was born with Charlotte Katharina, born in Stuttgart, also became a member of the Stuttgart hosiery guild. Kaiser, was married and earned the championship title in 1784.

Johann Ludwig's son Johann Friedrich Carl Benger (1788–1849), who was married to Maria Frech from Degerloch, was made chief guild master of hosiery in Stuttgart in 1837. He got a bonus when he bought an improved loom and a silver medal of honor for his products at an industrial exhibition in Stuttgart. He was also honored on the occasion of the First German Industrial Exhibition in Mainz .

Wilhelm Benger Sons or Benger-Ribana

Wilhelm Benger senior

His son Wilhelm Friedrich Benger (1818–1864) married Margarete Magdalena Kaiser (1820–1855) after he had passed the master craftsman's examination in 1844. He then bought a weaver's house in Degerloch , where he set up his own business in Kleine Falterstraße 18, where he produced for his own and for the customers of his father, who died in 1849. In 1852 he wanted to start processing cotton on knitting chairs , which had been built according to the model of corresponding machines from Troyes . Benger had his first chair based on the French model manufactured by Schlosser Binder in Ebingen. However, the apparatus was not yet convincing. The second chair was made by Honore Frédéric Fouquet and Carl Terrot , who founded a factory for such devices with the Stuttgart Major d'Ambly and the iron dealer Nopper. The merchants Carl Neeff & Co. in Stuttgart and Wilhelm Benger's mother appeared as financiers . After these knitting chairs had proven themselves at Wilhelm Benger, he acquired more, which were also manufactured by Fouquet and Terrot and on which wool could also be processed. Soon he was employing between 40 and 50 weavers and had expanded his clientele accordingly, and the handicraft business became a factory. In 1855 he took part in the World Exhibition in Paris . After the death of his first wife, he married Juliane Regine Faut (1824–1874) in 1856. In 1858 he moved the business to Obere Weinsteige in Degerloch, where he employed 60 workers. However, the new location soon became too small, so that in August 1864 the company moved to Stuttgart to a rented property on Hauptstätter Strasse. Wilhelm Benger died on September 5, 1864, in the middle of the move.

Wilhelm Benger sons

Wilhelm Benger's widow took care of the eight children from two marriages of her husband and ran the business together with her 19-year-old stepson, who was also called Wilhelm. The first two years brought little business results, but the wars of 1866 and 1870/71 brought an upturn in jersey weaving . In 1868 the company moved to a larger property at Sophienstrasse 7. From 1872, the second son, Gottlieb Benger (1851–1903), was the commercial manager of the company. At that time about 60 workers were employed at Benger and they operated 14 round chairs. After the early death of Julie Benger, the company traded under Wilhelm Benger Sons from 1874 . In 1877 a steam engine was installed in their factory.

In the entourage of Gustav Jaeger , Wilhelm and Gottlieb Benger produced reform laundry from wool from 1879 onwards. These products, which were to be very successful for Benger and Jaeger, were preceded by persistent negotiations. Jaeger insisted on certain production processes and was initially reluctant to manufacture underwear, as he viewed them as “superfluous furniture” and instead propagated single-layer woolen textiles, especially normal shirts and shirt trousers, while the Benger brothers believed in multi-layered and multi-part conventional underwear from underwear and outerwear. After an agreement was finally reached, the underwear that Jaeger originally rejected became the real hit in the range. From 1882 the company was located on Böblinger Straße in Heslach . The place of business was expanded and stocked several times.

Although the company had a trademark and an exclusive contract with Gustav Jaeger, other companies soon began to produce reform laundry according to Jaeger's specifications. In 1887 a separate department was set up for Gustav Jaeger on the Benger factory premises, in which Gustav Jaeger himself carried out a quality control of the reform products. The products were given a further quality mark and were divided into three product groups: the first two groups included those items that strictly adhered to Jaeger's specifications in terms of fabric and color, the third group included products that did not exactly meet Jaeger's specifications, but which did not contradict them either.

The company has received numerous awards for its products, including the Silver Medal at the State Trade Exhibition in Stuttgart in 1881, the Gold Medal at the Regional Exhibition in Budweis in 1883, the Golden Medal at the First World Hygiene Exhibition in London in 1885 and at the International Exhibition in Paris 1886. In the same year there was an award from the British Sanitary Congress in New York, in 1893 the gold medal of the Worlds Columbian Exposition in Chicago, in 1900 the Paris Grand Prix.

Wilhelm Benger died in 1896. His brother Gottlieb then managed the company alone until his death in 1903. The widows then each joined the company and the management was taken over in 1903 by the son of the father of the same name, also named Wilhelm (III.). From 1905 he shared the management with his brother Heinrich.

In the early years of the 20th century, American developers pushed their way onto the European market with new types of looms. Various suppliers also approached Benger and the company acquired a machine with Cooper's Spring-Needle system , with which ribbed goods were included in the production program. For this new product segment, which was produced from 1911, Wilhelm Benger chose the brand name Ribana , which he derived from the name of a squaw in an Indian book. In addition, cotton was processed at that time .

At the beginning of the First World War, Berger had 703 round chairs, 39 chairs for Ribana underwear, 24 knitting machines, 19 bobbins, 256 sewing machines and 60 flat and round linking machines.

The managing directors joined the army in the First World War , whereupon the previous authorized signatories Carl Stump and Christian Zinser took over the management. During the war, the focus was on the production of army clothing. Soon there were supply bottlenecks for the raw materials required, so that in the end only inferior materials were used for production. Inferior quality remained for the time being even after the end of the war, before sources of supply for high-quality materials could be found again. In the difficult time of inflation, Benger managed to enlarge the machine park. Wilhelm (III) Benger died during the high inflation. The surviving brother Heinrich Benger then ran the business alone. The following years were marked by ups and downs. The 1925 financial year brought record demand, the global economic crisis at the end of the 1920s caused a lull, and business picked up again in the mid-1930s.

In the 1920s and 1930s, products made from rayon and later from rayon made up an important segment of production. During the time of the Third Reich, the percentage of rayon increased many times over due to the state's efforts to become self-sufficient.

In 1936 Heinrich Benger resigned from the management. The company was converted into a limited partnership, with Wilhelm (IV.) And Alex Benger, the two sons of Wilhelm (III.) Benger, appointed as personally liable partners.

After the outbreak of World War II , the company also produced Wehrmacht trousers and shirts, and sales of civilian products collapsed at the same time. From 1941, Benger also began producing cargo parachutes and braking parachutes for the air force. At the same time, stocking production was outsourced to a separate company that emerged from the former Benger Gerätebau GmbH . From 1943 onwards, various production buildings were damaged or destroyed by bombs, and at the same time more and more skilled workers were drafted into the Wehrmacht. The tricot production was to be outsourced to Dutch and French factories as part of the westward relocation of German knitting , but the front that became apparent after the invasion in the west prevented implementation. At the end of the Second World War, production came to a complete standstill.

After the end of the war, the company received approval on July 17, 1945 to restart production. In November 1945 the Allies appointed Erwin Goebel as a trustee for the two Benger companies. In 1946, a makeshift production started again. The parent company manufactured sweaters in particular, the GmbH manufactured stockings. The company only experienced a significant upswing with the currency reform in 1948. Soon afterwards, the war-torn production facilities were rebuilt and the machinery was modernized, whereupon a wide range of clothing could be offered.

Branches abroad

The factory building in Bregenz. Painting by Josef Boss

In order to avoid the negative effects of the tariff increase, with which Austria-Hungary tried to curb imports from abroad in 1885, the Benger brothers set up a branch near Bregenz . Karl Benger, a brother of Wilhelm and Gottlieb Bengers, took over the management. A few years later a warehouse and an office were set up in Vienna, as well as a branch in Berlin .

For the sale of the products in England and in the British colonies, the Dr. Jaeger's Sanitary Woolen System Company Limited was founded, but it was only loosely connected to the main factory and completely separated from Benger during the First World War. This English company set up a branch in New York, which from 1885 was also named Dr. Jaeger's Sanitary Woolen System Company Limited appeared, but was soon heavily indebted. In 1889 Benger then founded his own branch in New York, which was managed by Ernst Benger and which lasted until the First World War.

In 1894 about 1000 people were employed at Benger and the company used more than 700 looms. After the Habsburg monarchy collapsed, it expanded to Slovenia , Hungary and Czechoslovakia .

Karl and Eberhard Benger, who employed around 400 people in Bregenz in 1938, took over the Viennese companies A. Königstein and Sachs & Hohenberg during the Third Reich .

Relocation to Bad Rappenau and bankruptcy

A branch was set up in Bad Rappenau as early as the 1950s and in 1963 Wilhelm Benger Söhne moved to Bad Rappenau. In 1973 the family company, which had been run as a limited partnership since 1936 , was transformed into a GmbH & Co KG. transformed. In 1980, Benger Germany merged with the company in Bregenz, which at that time employed around 500 people. In 1983 bankruptcy proceedings were opened against Benger Ribana GmbH & Co. KG.

Maute-Benger

The Benger brothers also set up a shop on Sophienstraße in Stuttgart and signed it to their sister Wilhelmine in 1890 on the occasion of their wedding to Gotthold Maute. The shop was named Gotthold Maute-Benger . In the 19th century, the business moved from Sophienstrasse to the Kleiner Bazar at Wilhelmsbau . The son of the Maute-Benger couple, Hermann Maute, opened another shop in the midnight building in 1928 , which is said to have been one of the most elegant shops in Stuttgart, but which was destroyed in the Second World War. After the end of the war, Maute-Benger settled in the New Chancellery in Stuttgart. The range has been expanded to include swimwear, especially from Benger-Ribana. Hermann Maute died in 1961 without leaving any direct descendants. His nephew Wilhelm Breuning and his son Werner took over the company and renovated the shop in 1966. In 1985 Maute-Benger moved into the more than 400-year-old monastery cellar on Königstraße . In 1998 the shop was expanded to include the shop space of the former neighbor, Foto- Hildenbrand . Since 2003 Maute-Benger has been run by Anneke and Marjoke Breuning , two daughters of Werner Breuning. They expanded the business in 2004 after the Black Forest Bote moved out , so that it now has more than 1100 m². Maute-Benger was awarded first prize in the category Reference Shop by sous in 2006.

Deuschle-Benger

Carl Deuschle, who married Julie Benger, a sister of Carl and Ernst Benger, founded a trading subsidiary for Benger products in Amsterdam in 1886, which existed as KF Deuschle-Benger Trictotage en Lingerie until 1987.

Patronage

Enclosure of the park in Uhlbach

Gottlieb Benger, who was the largest employer in Stuttgart at the turn of the century, left his mark on Stuttgart-Uhlbach in particular . After he had married the winemaker's daughter Luise Currle (1857–1931), with whom he had their daughter Martha in 1879, he built a summer villa at the foot of the Götzenberg, which was surrounded by a large park. The building, designed by the Stuttgart architects Ludwig Eisenlohr and Carl Weigle , was presented in the Architektonische Rundschau in 1895 with two zincographs . The family was socially active, for example by building a kindergarten in Uhlbach , and also gladly donated money for cultural purposes. To a large extent, it financed the redesign of the Uhlbacher Andreaskirche , which Heinrich Dolmetsch carried out in 1895 . While the summer villa in Benger fell victim to the bombing raids in the Second World War , the St. Andrew's Church was preserved, along with the pews of the entrepreneurial family and their monumental burial site in the adjacent cemetery. This is separated from the rest of the cemetery; There are lockable viewing hatches in the iron gate. Karl August Donndorf designed the two angel figures that flank the black granite tombstone. The street to the Andreaskirche is now called Luise-Benger-Straße .

Wilhelm and Gottlieb Benger also donated an organ for the new church, which was built in Degerloch in 1889.

Gottlieb Benger, who was, among other things, the secret councilor of commerce and the Romanian consul general, wrote two books about this country: Romania in 1900 , published by Engelhorn in 1900, and Romania, a country of the future by the same publisher four years earlier . In 1894 the Benger brothers also published a work for the 50th anniversary of the W. Benger Söhne company.

literature

• Karl Sachisthal: The History of the House of Wilhelm Benger Sons Stuttgart 1854–1954. Darmstadt 1954.
• Gerhard Raff : Can also speak standard German. Schwaigern 2013, ISBN 978-3-943066-22-7 , pp. 133-136.

Web links

• Pictures on bfhg.de

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c} Sachisthal: History ... p. 15.
2. ^ ^{A b} Paul Gehring: Benger, Wilhelm Friedrich. In: Neue Deutsche Biographie 2 (1955), p. 48 online version .
3. ^ Didaskalia. Leaves for mind, spirit and publicity. Volume 3, twentieth year, July – December 1842
4. ↑ ^{a b} Chronicle of Degerloch on degerloch.info
5. ↑ Sachisthal: History ... p. 25.
6. ↑ Sachisthal: History ... p. 26.
7. ↑ Sachisthal: History ... p. 30.
8. ↑ ^{a b} H. W., Wilhelm Benger and Sons ( Memento of the original from September 13, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. on beta.vol.at. 
9. ↑ ^{a b} Sachisthal: History… pp. 60–62.
10. ↑ Peter Melichar : Displacement and Expansion. Expropriations and provisions in Vorarlberg. Oldenbourg Wissenschaftsverlag 2004, ISBN 3-486-56783-7 , p. 109.
11. ↑ Benger-Ribana establishes a branch in Bad Rappenau. In: The time. 4th October 1956.
12. ↑ Database computer IBM / 38 for stocking knitters on computerwoche.de.
13. ↑ Wirtschaftsarchiv Baden-Württemberg: Benger Ribana on wabw.uni-hohenheim.de.
14. ↑ Sachisthal: History… pp. 64–66.
15. ↑ History on maute-benger.de.
16. ↑ Sachisthal: History… pp. 70–71.
17. ↑ winkelstories.com
18. ↑ ^{a b} Georg Thilenius: Tinkering is innate on landpunktee.blogspot.de.
19. ↑ Fritz Endemann: Chronicle of the home community of the Uhlbach Musikverein ( memento of the original from September 12, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. on musikverein-uhlbach.de. 
20. ↑ The spring water that was once used in this villa now flows through a fountain, see A fountain for the Uhlbachers on neuarbeit.de.
21. ↑ Fritz Endemann: Andreaskirche Uhlbach ( Memento of the original from September 12, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. on obertuerkheim-evangelisch.de. 
22. ↑ Staib, Civic Association in Uhlbach , June 17, 2013 on bv-bad-cannstatt.de.
23. ↑ Offices ( Memento of the original from September 13, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. on stuttgartzuffenhausen.de.