Caspar Honegger

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Caspar Honegger's tomb in the Rüti cemetery

Caspar Honegger (born December 12, 1804 in Rüti ; † January 7, 1883 there ) was a Swiss entrepreneur . He improved the mechanical looms used at that time to the well-known "Honegger loom" and became known as the "weaver king".

Honegger as an entrepreneur

Caspar Honegger was the fifth child of Regula and Salomon Honegger . He was already working in his father's spinning mill at the age of seven , was a foreman at the age of 15 and the technical manager of the family business at the age of 17. Together with his brother Heinrich , Caspar Honegger was entrusted with the management of the factory in Widacher (a district of Rüti) in 1827, and in 1834 a cotton weaving mill with 50 looms delivered from England was opened in Siebnen (today the old factory in Siebnen ).

In 1841 Honegger invented a new type of loom for cotton and silk weaving , the "Honegger chair" named after him: the machines supplied from England did not meet his requirements. He expanded the company in Siebnen to include a mechanical workshop to manufacture the loom he had developed.

Factory site Joweid in Rüti

With the outbreak of the Sonderbund War , Honegger relocated his workshops from the Catholic Siebnen in two nights to the Protestant Rüti in his Joweid plant , named after a meadow on the river of the same name . The company then continues the production operations that have been relocated from Siebnen as "Caspar Honegger, Maschinenfabrik Rüti".

Kottern Textil - the first company of its kind in the Allgäu

The later Maschinenfabrik Rüti AG was followed in 1848 by the establishment of spinning mills and cotton weaving mills in Einsiedeln , Kottern bei Kempten (Allgäu) (first spinning mill and weaving mill in Allgäu), Nuolen , Wangen, Lachen, Thusis and Baldenstein. At the age of 60, Honegger largely handed over the management of the company to his sons and sons-in-law. His looms continued to find numerous customers, and by 1870 30,000 looms were sold worldwide. The 60 or so most valuable pieces from the Honegger family's former weaving machine collection have been exhibited in the historic Neuthal textile factory near Bäretswil since April 2010 .

Honegger loom

In search of improvements to the Honegger's opinion of defective machines from English production, he achieved a significant acceleration of the weaving process in 1840 with the invention of the so-called Honegger pitch, by significantly increasing the speed of the thread insertion. With the loom built in 1860 it was about 130 picks / min; this type was suitable for light cotton fabrics up to 90 cm wide. Inspired by his success in the manufacture of individual machines, Caspar Honegger began series production of weaving machines in Siebnen in 1842. Twenty years later, 30,000 of the Honegger looms had already been sold, and by the time production was discontinued it should be around 500,000.

  • Honegger loom from 1860 (exhibit in Amthaus Rüti )

  • Loom from the Rüti weaving mill, in operation around 1950, now on display in the Bleiche in Wald ZH

Honegger as a politician and patron

Schoolhouse Schlossberg

At the age of 24, Caspar Honegger became mayor and from 1828 to 1834 mayor of Rüti. In 1838/39 he was elected to the Zurich Grand Council as a liberal (resignation after the Zurich coup ).

Honegger played a key role in promoting the Glattallinie, which went into operation in 1856, and thanks to his influence, he was able to ensure that the route did not lead south of Rüti as planned, but through the village center of Rüti directly in front of the gates of his factory.

Honegger founded Switzerland's first factory health insurance fund as early as 1834, and various pension funds, workers' apartments and churches can be traced back to his initiative. He donated the kindergarten and the Schlossberg school building to his hometown, and in 1873 the first organ of the Reformed Church and four bells to ring it. His descendants transferred a further 13,000 Swiss francs to an organ fund for the church administration and donated the Rüti hospital , later the district hospital , today the intercantonal recruitment center of the Swiss army in Rüti , in his memory .

Merits

Honegger's inventive and entrepreneurial spirit may have contributed significantly to the upswing of weaving in Europe. His looms received various international awards and his high reputation earned him the highest honor at the time: in 1878 he was made a Knight of the Legion of Honor .

literature

Web links

Commons : Caspar Honegger  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e f g Information boards in the Rüti office building
  2. ↑ a b c Information board in the Rüti cemetery
  3. ↑ Caspar Honegger meets Adolf Guyer-Zeller. In: Neue Zürcher Zeitung . April 19, 2010, accessed January 19, 2011
  4. ↑ a b Building Department Zurich (Ed.): Webmaschinensammlung Neuthal, Bäretswil. Inauguration documentation for the renovation . Zurich, 2010.
personal data
SURNAME Honegger, Caspar
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Swiss entrepreneur
DATE OF BIRTH December 12, 1804
PLACE OF BIRTH Rüti ZH
DATE OF DEATH January 7, 1883
Place of death Rüti ZH