Dietrich Gruen

Patent dated December 22, 1874

Dietrich Gruen (born February 22, 1847 in Osthofen , † April 10, 1911 in Italy ) was a German-American watchmaker who emigrated to the United States in 1867 and one of the most important American watch manufacturers during the first half of the 20th century with the Gruen Watch Company founded.

Life

Childhood and education in Germany

Dietrich Grün was born on February 22nd, 1847 in Osthofen , Rhineland-Hesse , and attended both public and private schools. At the age of 15 he learned watchmaking from the important watchmaker teacher Jess Hans Martens (1826-1892) in Freiburg / Baden and worked in Karlsruhe and Wiesbaden , among others . After completing his training, he went to Switzerland for three years .

In the United States

In 1867, at the age of 20, he traveled to the United States , where he followed his three older brothers who had emigrated to the United States before him. One of his three brothers had died in the American Civil War in 1863 . On this trip he met Pauline Wittlinger, the daughter of a watchmaker. Wittlinger lived in Delaware, Ohio . In 1869, he married and moved to Delaware, where he worked for his father-in-law.

Dietrich and Pauline's first child was their son Frederick (Fritz) G. Gruen, born on April 15, 1872 in Delaware. The second son, George J. Gruen, was born in 1877.

From 1906 Dietrich Gruen suffered from heart problems and passed the business more and more to his sons. In 1911, Dietrich Gruen and his son Frederick took the steamship "Berlin", like almost every year, on a trip to Europe. Frederick was supposed to take care of business matters, Dietrich wanted to go to Bad Nauheim for a cure . Shortly before arriving in Italy, Dietrich Gruen suddenly succumbed to heart failure on April 10, 1911. He was buried in Spring Grove Cemetery in Cincinnati, Ohio , where his tomb can still be seen today.

Work and business

In 1874 Dietrich Gruen received a patent for an improved minute wheel safety drive in clockworks , which was supposed to prevent damage to a clock if the spiral spring for driving the clock broke.

In 1876 he founded the Columbus Watch Manufacturing Company in Columbus / Ohio with a partner , which he left again in 1894 due to economic difficulties. In the same year he and his older son Frederick founded the watch company “D. Gruen & Son ”, which three years later when their younger son Georg joined“ D. Gruen & Sons ”was renamed. The company expanded with its own clockwork production to Glashütte in Saxony and later Biel / Switzerland . In the 1920s, the Gruen Watch Company , as it was later called, was America's largest watch manufacturer.

literature

Schliesser, Paul: Gruen, The Art & Mystery of Watchmaking, http://www.pixelp.com/gruen/
Sauerborn, Franz D: Jess Hans Martens 1826-1892: First teacher at the pocket watch maker school in Furtwangen. - Training workshop for watchmakers in Freiburg in Baden, Verlag F.-D. Sauerborn, Buggingen, 2003

Web links

Individual evidence

↑ Jess Hans Martens
↑ Spring Grove Cemetery
^ Dietrich Gruen in the Find a Grave database . Retrieved January 8, 2015.

personal data
SURNAME	Gruen, Dietrich
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	watchmaker of German origin
DATE OF BIRTH	February 22, 1847
PLACE OF BIRTH	Osthofen
DATE OF DEATH	April 10, 1911
Place of death	Italy

[1] Jess Hans Martens

[2] Spring Grove Cemetery

[3] Dietrich Gruen in the Find a Grave database . Retrieved January 8, 2015.