Carl Hecker

This article deals with the businessman Carl Hecker. For other people see Karl Hecker .

Carl Hecker (also spelled Karl Hecker ) (born September 22, 1795 in Elberfeld (now part of Wuppertal ), † March 17, 1873 in Bonn ) was a businessman in Elberfeld.

Life

Carl Hecker's father, Christoph Johann Kaspar Hecker, came from a middle-class family in Hattingen and came to Elberfeld during his apprenticeship years. In 1790 he married Johanna Katharina Schlieper, who came from an Elberfeld merchant family. With his brother-in-law, Peter Wilhelm Schlieper, he founded the silk dyeing and printing company Schlieper & Hecker in 1818 , which merged in 1826 with the Bockmühl brothers' ribbon factory to form the new Bockmühl, Schlieper & Hecker calico printing company . Carl Hecker joined this company in 1828 as his father's partner. Before that, in 1821 Hecker married Johanna Theodora Wilberg (* 1800), daughter of the pedagogue Johann Friedrich Wilberg .

In addition to his entrepreneurial activity, Hecker devoted himself increasingly to public offices. In 1831 he became a co-founder of the first Elberfeld Citizens' Association alongside Feldmann-Simons and was administrator at the Central Charity. In January he became a member of the Elberfeld and Barmen Chamber of Commerce, and five years later in April 1840 he was elected President with 8 of 13 votes. This made him the "President of the Great Crisis" that spread in the Wupper Valley in the early 1840s . During these years Hecker was also consul of the United States and a member of the board of the Bergisch-Märkische Eisenbahngesellschaft .

When Hecker made a toast to the “Rhenish Law” at the “ Cologne-Düsseldorf Fraternization Festival ” on July 4, 1843 , there were “tumultuous” demonstrations of enthusiasm, which ultimately led to the event being broken off.

After the Barmer chamber member Johann Schuchard publicly attacked him in the press for his political stance as a representative of extreme liberalism and in this context accused him of abuse of office, Hecker resigned as president and member of the chamber in January 1847. His honor was so touched that he drew his conclusions despite a declaration of confidence and the rejection of the attacks against him.

In 1846 he was elected deputy district representative and city councilor as leader of the liberal left. In 1847, Hecker applied for a petition to be sent to the provincial parliament, in which he called for a constitutional constitution. After the censors made significant deletions on his application, he submitted a new application to allow citizens to attend the municipal council meetings. This request was rejected, however, which led him to higher political activity, whereby he became a leading member of the now established Political Club, which represented the views of resolute liberalism. When the Elberfeld uprising broke out in May 1849, he joined the security committee as a city councilor, which was responsible for running the city. Although Hecker took a moderate stance in the uprising, he was ostracized . On November 5, 1849, he was declared by royal decree to be unable to work for the community council .

Hecker left the company Gebrüder Bockmühl, Schlieper & Hecker in 1851 and moved to Bonn, where he died in retirement at the age of 78.

literature

• Uwe Eckardt: Carl Hecker (1795–1873). In: Wolfhard Weber (Ed.) Bergisch-Märkische entrepreneurs of the early industrialization. (= Rheinisch-Westfälische Wirtschaftsbiographien , Volume 18.) Aschendorff, Münster 2004, pp. 394–419.