Elsa Buchwitz
Elsa Buchwitz (born October 5, 1929 in Hameln as Elsa König , † November 20, 1997 ibid) was a German local politician and activist . She is seen as a champion for a historic old town renovation in the 1970s in Hameln.
Life
Elsa Buchwitz was born out of wedlock to 21-year-old Else König from Hameln. Her father was a Hungarian music student whom her mother had met in Leipzig , where she was employed as a maid for six months . She grew up without her father in her mother's extended family, first in the Rohrsen district of Hamelin and, from 1932, in Hameln. Her mother married in 1934 and Elsa had a stepfather who adopted her.
First she trained as a milliner and later as a hardware saleswoman . In 1955 she married Helmut Buchwitz, whose parents ran a hardware store in Hameln. Together with her mother, Elsa Buchwitz ran the Hotel Rosenhof with a restaurant in the Rohrsen district from 1963 in a former villa . The guests included prominent actors, including Götz George , Eddi Arent and Anneliese Rothenberger .
From the end of the 1970s until her death, Elsa Buchwitz lived in the old town of Hamelin in a house she restored from 1622. She also restored a Bödnerhaus built in 1620 in the old town of Hameln, where she opened a pancake restaurant in 1983 .
In her home town of Hameln, Elsa Buchwitz was involved in local politics as a member of the CDU . From 1973 to 1997 she was a member of the city council in Hameln. From 1977 to 1986 she was also a member of the district council of the Hameln-Pyrmont district . In the Lower Saxony Heimatbund she was the deputy chairwoman of the monument preservation group .
Commitment to historic old town renovation
In 1968 the citizens' initiative Vereinigung Hamelin Citizens for the Preservation of their Old Town e. V. , which included around 250 people who were affected by the urban redevelopment and sympathizers. In the association she was first secretary and from 1972 chairwoman. The reason for the founding of the citizens' initiative was the resolution of the Hamelin City Council in 1967 to carry out a comprehensive renovation of Hamelin's old town. As an area renovation, it was intended to lead to a large-scale demolition of the historic buildings in order to make space for new construction projects. Of the 677 front buildings in the old town at that time, around 200 were to be demolished. At that time, the city of Hameln had become the “No. 1 model case” for old town renovations in the Federal Republic and Lower Saxony. The federal government supported this project in 1968 with DM one million to start the renovation.
The citizens' initiative protested against the redevelopment plans through letters to the editor and demonstrations, including a visit by the then Federal Housing Minister Lauritz Lauritzen . In 1968 Elsa Buchwitz and friends stuck posters on over 100 houses threatened with demolition with the words “God protect this house from hardship and fire - and from urban planning”. In 1970 she wrote a brochure with the title “Model case No. 1 for the destruction of our old towns?” Alluding to the area renovation concept. After she had presented herself on the rubble of demolished houses in the media, she was popularly known as “Trümmer-Elsa”.
Due to the activities of the citizens' initiative Vereinigung Hamelin Citizens for the Preservation of their Old Town e. V. , in which Elsa Buchwitz had played a major role, there was resistance in the Hamelin population against the demolition mentality and the destruction of the historic houses. Due to the resulting public pressure, the city of Hameln changed its redevelopment concept in 1973 in which it abandoned the area redevelopment in favor of a sensitive property redevelopment.
Afterlife
After Elsa Buchwitz's death in 1997, she was referred to in Hameln as the “savior of the old town” because of her moral courage and her commitment to preserving the historic old town center and renovating the old town in accordance with its heritage. At her former home at Großehofstrasse 31/32 in Hameln, a text panel provides information about her life and work.
In 2004, Elsa-Buchwitz-Straße was named after her in a new development in Hamelin's Scharnhorstviertel .
In 2017, the Pattensen-based writer Günter von Lonski announced in a press interview that he is currently working on a musical about Elsa Buchwitz, the “local heroine from Hameln”. The premiere was in early 2018.
Since 2018 there have been guided tours of the old town in Hameln, on which Elsa Buchwitz's work in this context is a topic. The tour is entitled “Rubble Elsa saves the old town”.
Elsa Buchwitz was buried in 1997 in a family grave in the Am Wehl cemetery. Since the rest period ends in 2022 and the care of the grave by relatives was no longer ensured, the Hamelin city administration proposed in 2018 that the grave be rededicated as an honorary grave. In this way, the grave would be preserved permanently. The city council agreed.
Awards
- Federal Cross of Merit on Ribbon , 1984
- Silver hemisphere of the German National Committee for Monument Protection , 1986
Publications
- Elsa Buchwitz (responsible for images and accompanying texts): Hameln: Model case No. 1 for the destruction of our old towns? Published by the Association of Hamelin Citizens for the Preservation of their Old Town e. V. Self-published, Hameln 1970.
- Well, what does grandma say? A fun, almost unbelievable and yet true story. Salzer, Heilbronn 1984, ISBN 3-7936-0238-9 .
literature
- Helga Altkrüger-Roller: Courageous women from Hameln and the surrounding area. Glückel von Hameln, Elsbeth Best, Frida Levy, Ada Lessing, Rosa Helfers, Marie Lodemann, Irmgard Flügge-Lotz, Freya Markus, Käte Arend, Elsa Buchwitz . GG-Verlag, Hameln 2012, ISBN 978-3-939492-39-9 , chapter: Elsa Buchwitz (1929–1997) , p. 96-113 .
- Viktoria Lukas-Krohm: Monument protection and preservation from 1975 to 2005 with a focus on Bavaria (= writings from the faculty of humanities and cultural sciences of the Otto-Friedrich-Universität Bamberg . Volume 19 ). University of Bamberg Press, Bamberg 2014, ISBN 978-3-86309-272-6 , pp. 71 (also dissertation, University of Bamberg 2013).
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Uwe Altrock and a. (Ed.): The end of cautiousness? (= Yearbook Urban Renewal 2013 ). Universitätsverlag der TU Berlin, Belin 2014, ISBN 978-3-7983-2644-6 , p. 73 ( limited preview in the Google book search).
- ↑ Federal government gives 1 million to start the renovation . In: Deister and Weser newspaper . April 20, 1968, p. 3 ( online at archiv.dewezet.de [accessed on August 30, 2017]).
- ↑ Large-scale renovation in the 1970s - renovation of the old town in Hameln. In: historisches-weserbergland.de. Retrieved August 30, 2017 .
- ↑ Christa Koch: When the old town should be "cleaned up". In: dewezet.de. February 3, 2014, accessed August 30, 2017 .
- ↑ See information on four street names in Hameln in 2004. In: SPD local association Hameln: Rosa Helfers. In: spd-hameln.de. Retrieved August 30, 2017 .
- ↑ Kim Gallop: Author von Lonski feels the pulse of the times. In: haz.de. Hannoversche Allgemeine Zeitung , July 19, 2017, accessed on August 31, 2017 .
- ↑ Kim Gallop: Author von Lonski presents a musical about Hameln in Hannoversche Allgemeine Zeitung from February 9, 2018
- ↑ Lorena Brümmer: Trümmer-Elsa saves the old town - New adventure tour in Hameln in the new week from July 23, 2018
- ↑ Prefabricated buildings instead of the old town? "Trümmer-Elsa saves the old town" Special Hamelin experience tour at Weser-Ith News on July 23, 2018
- ↑ Grave of honor for Elsa Buchwitz? in Dewezet on April 30, 2018
- ^ Elsa Buchwitz receives honorary grave in Dewezet from June 21, 2018
- ↑ a b Elsa Buchwitz. In: pfannekuchen-hameln.de. Archived from the original on October 29, 2010 ; accessed on August 30, 2017 .
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Buchwitz, Elsa |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | König, Elsa (maiden name) |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | German local politician (CDU) and activist |
| DATE OF BIRTH | October 5, 1929 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Hamelin |
| DATE OF DEATH | November 20, 1997 |
| Place of death | Hamelin |