Carl Brendgen

Carl Andreas Brendgen (born October 10, 1841 in Kierdorf ; † March 23, 1916 there ) was an entrepreneur in the young lignite industry in the Rhenish lignite district .

Brendgen Werke letterhead

Life

Brendgen was born into the lignite mining that had just begun in the Ville . His father Everhard, from Herrig , was the mine manager of the mines of Count Wolff Metternich from Gymnich . The family lived on a farm in the Zieselsmaar district . In 1872 he married Luise, b. Koenig, and with her had two daughters, Louise and Marie, and two sons, Carl and Eduard.

Act

Brendgen set up his own business early on by founding a brick factory based on the principle of Hoffmann's ring kiln , patented previously in 1859, and a clay pit on the Villehang in Zieselsmaar. Its bricks have a yellow color due to the high proportion of lime. They still stand out today in buildings from his time. The sale of its tiles, tiles, floor tiles and clay pipes went as far as the up-and-coming Cologne . The pottery was burned with the help of the coarse charred tree stumps within the brown coal deposits , the so-called nibbles . The company developed so well that he soon took over and expanded another brick factory in Horrem .

In 1858 the first steam briquette press for dry briquettes according to the Exter system went into operation near Halle in the Central German district . In the Rhineland, wet stones were initially pressed. The first drying press went into operation on the Roddergrube in 1877 . As early as 1872 Carl Brendgen leased the southern part of the Hubertus concession from Count Wilhelm Wolff Metternich zu Gymnich and in 1891 he bought an approximately 220 hectare mining field between Kierdorf and Liblar, known as the coal source . In the same year he began building a modern briquette factory under the company "Carl Brendgen, Braunkohlen-, Briket- & Thonwerke in Zisselsmaar". A briquette press cost around 250,000 Reichsmarks at the turn of the century. A year later in 1892 the second press was added. This factory was the first modern one on the south side of the Ville. At the end of 1897 he leased from Count Ferdinand Wolff Metternich to the canal at Schloss Gracht in Liblar for 15,000 Reichsmarks annually, the part of the Concordia field up to Luxemburger Strasse in front of Liblar. In the following year, Brendgen and partners had the Concordia-Süd briquette factory built in Liblar with three, later five, briquette presses. Concordia produced until 1938. He expanded the Zieselsmaar field around 1900 to include the additional "Katharina" mining field. Zisselsmaar was also converted into a GmbH in 1902 in order to secure the capital requirements for the mechanization of the mining and the works (today open- cast mine residue lake Zieselsmaar ). Finally, the Concordia-Nordfeld was leased and a third briquette factory was added to the Kohlenquelle / Zieselsmaar plant. Sales were significantly boosted by the construction of railway lines. Important for Brendgen was the construction of the Mödrath-Liblar-Brühler Eisenbahn (MLB) by the Cologne West German Railway Company , to which the Zieselsmaar factory got a siding. The company opened on March 1, 1899. The main purpose of the railway was to develop lignite mines and briquette factories. Before that, production had to be driven to the Liblar train station in horse-drawn vehicles. With the end of the pits, the railway was no longer necessary and was consequently shut down. The last establishment was the mining law union Hubertus , which bought the relevant field from the Gymnich counts and built the Hubertus briquette factory in Brüggen, which was converted into an AG in 1908. From 1960 the 'Hubertus' factory in Brüggen belonged to the Rheinische Braunkohlenwerke AG . After a severe coal dust explosion with many victims in the spring of 1964, the factory closed its factory gates forever. Most recently in 1911 Brendgen expanded its KohlenQuelle / Zieselsmaar factory with an attached new building and seven presses for Concordia Nord . Immediately before the Second World War , the works in the 'Erft-Bergbau AG.' on. In the mid-1950s, ' Roddergrube AG took over .' in Brühl the line. Concordia continued to produce until 1958. The remaining open pit is now Lake Concordia .

At the height of his work, Brendgen had a villa with a park ( arboretum ) and animal enclosure built on Heerstraße in Kierdorf and named it Villa Louise . The initials K and L (Karl and Luise) are still attached to the building. (Today the administrative headquarters of the RWE Power AG forestry office).

Villa Louise

Honorary positions and foundations

From June 1, 1877 until his death, Carl Brendgen was a member of the Kierdorf municipal council and from 1900 to 1907 the head of the municipality. As a member of the church council, he obtained the settlement of the Hiltrup sisters , who were supposed to establish a kindergarten and sewing school. He made the leases of land available for maintenance. The project came about in 1918 only after the end of the First World War and two years after his death (until 1982 in Kierdorf). He donated the Borromeo Window for the church . In his will he committed his children to a foundation of generously measured land and monetary values ​​of around 37,000 Reichsmarks for the Kierdorf parish for the purpose of caring for the sick, elderly and youth of the residents of all denominations of the parish of Kierdorf, including the associated Rectorate Church in Brüggen.

literature

• Bert Rombach: Kierdorf - The cradle of the Rhenish lignite mining: Carl Brendgen - History and development of his briquette factories. History circle Kierdorf (ed.). 1st edition. Books on Demand, Norderstedt 2008, ISBN 978-3-8334-9711-7 .
• Volker HW Schüler, Manfred Coenen: The Rhenish briquette factories 'Hubertus' and 'Concordia' in Brüggen, Kierdorf and Liblar , (Documenta berchemensis historica special edition 3), Frechen 2007. ISBN 978-3-00-023072-1

Web links

• Historical Erftstadt: Rombach: Brendgen

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Brendgen family tree (accessed Jan. 2011; PDF; 14 kB)
2. ↑ End of Concordia (Wisoweg)
3. ↑ Article after Bert Rombach: Carl Brendgen - the founder of the lignite industry in Kierdorf. and: Carl Brendgen as "factory owner". In: City of Erftstadt: Yearbook 2007. (PDF at Erftstadt website)