Edmund Kelter

Eduard Marcellus Edmund Kelter (born August 17, 1867 in Hamburg ; † September 5, 1942 there ) was a German educator and historian .

Life and work as a teacher

The Hamburg-born wine press attended the Johanneum's school of scholars there , which he left in 1886 with the supplementary high school diploma. He then studied classical philology and history at universities in Berlin , Bonn , Jena and Kiel . In 1890 he was promoted to Dr. phil. PhD. A year later he passed the state examination at this university. Thus he was allowed to teach Greek, Latin and history in all grades of secondary schools and religion in the entry grades. From 1892 to 1894 he worked as a trial candidate at the Wilhelm Gymnasium and from 1893 taught on a temporary basis at his former school, the Johanneum.

In 1895, Kelter got a job as a senior teacher at the secondary school in front of the Lübecker Tor. A year later he went back to the Wilhelm Gymnasium, where he stayed until 1914. Here he not only taught, but also managed the library for several years. In 1909 he played a major role in the founding of the Hamburg high school rowing club and was its protector until 1914 . From 1910 to 1914 he was an extraordinary member of the commission that examined annual volunteers .

In April 1914, Kelter took over the management of the newly founded secondary school in Winterhude , but four months later, despite his advanced age, he volunteered for military service. During the First World War he initially worked in Belgium, including as local commandant for Lessines and Antoing . At the beginning of 1916 he returned to Hamburg for health reasons. In Altona he headed the department for the military preparation of the youth, which belonged to the deputy general command of the 9th Army Corps until the end of the war.

In the spring of 1919, due to revolutionary events, Kelter had to resign from his post as school director. In the following elections for school principals, which were based on a new school law of April 29, he did not run. He wanted to protest against new democratic elements in the school organization. He also distrusted colleagues who supported the reforms. Since school principals had to have a teaching load under the new law , Keller, as a classical philologist, saw no possibility of continuing to work at secondary schools. He therefore applied for a transfer to the Johanneum School of Academics, which was approved in October 1919. In the meantime he worked at the Museum of Hamburg History , where he was particularly interested in one of the oldest Elbe maps that had been rediscovered at the time.

In 1925, Kelter represented the seriously ill headmaster of the Johanneum, Emil Badstübner, who died in December of the same year. As the new headmaster elected by the college, Kelter ran the Johanneum until the spring of 1933. As headmaster, he tried to maintain the traditions of the empire, such as the celebration of Sedan Day . This led to conflicts with the democratically oriented Weimar Republic . On the other hand, he tried to maintain and reform the humanistic grammar school. For this reason he was considered very respected among traditional Hamburg citizens. He organized regular celebrations, exhibitions and sports festivals with which he wanted to promote the exchange between students, teachers and parents. He also founded the school choir. The celebration organized by Kelter on the occasion of the 400th anniversary of the school received particular public attention.

In retirement, Kelter became involved in 1933 as chairman of the association of former students at the Johanneum. At the end of 1936 he took over the editing of the club newspaper "Das Johanneum".

From 1920 to 1924, Kelter regularly gave lectures in Greek and Latin at the Hanseatic University . In October 1925 he co-founded the Hamburg regional section of the German Classical Philology Association and was its chairman until 1933.

Working as a historian

Kelter was a renowned historian who dealt with the history of education and schools in Hamburg. He described the history of the Johanneum and the Academic Gymnasium and their teachers in many publications . He also researched the French period in Hamburg . For this he wrote several monographs and many small contributions. These appeared in the journal of the Association for Hamburg History , in the communications of the Association for Hamburg History , the Hamburg History and Homeland Papers and the association journal of the Johanneum.

Kelter also wrote numerous articles that appeared in Hamburg daily newspapers and presented the history of Hamburg. From 1927 to 1937 he was a member of the Association for Hamburg History , for which he lectured several times. From 1933 he was involved in the board of directors of the scientific and astronomical association Urania and took over the office of treasurer in the Hamburg section of the association for Germanness abroad .

Honors

In 1911, the Hamburg Senate honored Kelter with the title of professor. The high school rowing club made him an honorary protector in 1914. To mark the 400th anniversary of the Johanneum, the Hamburg University made him an honorary member in 1929, as did the Old Masters Association of the Realgymnasium and the Association of Former Students of the School of Academics in 1933.

In 1950 the Kelterstrasse in Wellingsbüttel was named after Kelter. The winner of a regatta that has been rowed annually since 1955 between clubs of the Johanneum and the Hamburger Gymnasial-Ruderverein receives the Edmund-Kelter-Preis as a silver cup .

literature

• Gunnar B. Zimmermann: Kelter, Edmund . In: Franklin Kopitzsch, Dirk Brietzke (Hrsg.): Hamburgische Biographie . tape 5 . Wallstein, Göttingen 2010, ISBN 978-3-8353-0640-0 , p. 211-212 .

Web links

Wikisource: Edmund Kelter  - Sources and full texts

• Literature by and about Edmund Kelter in the catalog of the German National Library
• Newspaper article about Edmund Kelter in the 20th century press kit of the ZBW - Leibniz Information Center for Economics .