Emilio Odebrecht

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Emílio Odebrecht , also Emil Odebrecht (junior) (born December 18, 1894 in Santa Catarina , † August 22, 1962 in Salvador , Bahia ), was a Brazilian engineer , businessman and, above all, a pioneer in the use of reinforced concrete in northeastern Brazil. His grandfather was Emil Odebrecht , who emigrated to Brazil in 1856. He was the father of Norberto Odebrecht , founder of the Odebrecht group in Salvador da Bahia .

Life

Emílio Odebrecht was the son of Friedrich Edmund Heinrich Odebrecht (1864–1908) and Dorothea Gertrud Cecilie Odebrecht, née Altenburg (1870–1946). At the age of 20 he moved to Rio de Janeiro and met his cousin Emílio Henrique Baumgart , who studied at the polytechnic and worked in the "Companhia Construtora em Cimento Armado" , the first construction company in Brazil to use reinforced concrete was specialized. The company's founder was Lambert Riedlinger, who came to Brazil in 1911 in order to establish the reinforced concrete construction technology in Brazil, which is already known in Germany. Emílio Odebrecht joined the company and, alongside Riedlinger and Baumgart, was significantly involved in the industrial introduction of reinforced concrete in Brazil. Emílio Odebrecht later became known among Brazilian engineers as the "father of reinforced concrete".

Maurício de Nassau bridge in Recife , 2009

Emílio Odebrecht took over the construction of the 180-meter-long bridge in Maurício de Nassau, which became a landmark of Brazilian construction technology at the time. The calculation and planning of the bridge was carried out by Emílio Baumgart.

Emílio Odebrecht married Hertha Hinsch in 1918, moved from Blumenau to the underdeveloped northeast to Salvador da Bahia and founded the construction company “Gondim & Odebrecht” in 1919 with Isaac Gondim, with headquarters in Recife and branches in Jaraguá and Alagoas . This step formed the basis for the later development of the Odebrecht group of companies founded by his son Norberto in 1944. The development of Brazil in the post-war period and the subsequent "economic miracle" with the construction of dams , roads and subways , oil production facilities and nuclear power plants in Brazil became a real blessing for the Odebrecht group of companies.

Petrolina Cathedral, 2012

In 1923 Emílio Odebrecht dissolved the company "Gondim & Odebrecht" and in November 1923 founded the company "Emílio Odebrecht & Cia". During the reign of Sérgio Loreto as President of Pernambuco , Emílio Odebrecht built the Palace of Justice. As early as 1925, the company had branches in Salvador , Blumenau, João Pessoa and Maceió . In 1926 Emílio Odebrecht built the first reinforced concrete bridge in Itabuna over the river Cachoeira in the state of Bahia . In 1929 he built the Cathedral of Petrolina with a free-lying gable roof 30 meters long over the central nave.

In the early 1940s, Emílio Odebrecht retired from the construction business and returned to Santa Catarina. His son and later founder of the Odebrecht group of companies, while still a student at the Polytechnic School at the Universidade Federal da Bahia, completed the ongoing construction business. He completed his studies in 1943 and founded the Odebrecht group of companies in 1944. In the 1950s Emílio moved back to Bahia to work in an advisory capacity at the request of his son Norberto. Until his death at the age of 68, he continued to visit construction sites frequently, taught and carried out the necessary calculations for several projects.

Remarks

  1. ↑ The first experiments for reinforced concrete structures in Brazil took place around 1900. The train station in Mairinque near São Paulo by the Belgian architect Victor Dubugras is considered to be the first concrete building in Brazil . The industrial use of reinforced concrete in Brazil began in the mid-1910s.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Uma história sobre homens e cidades. Grandes Construções. (No longer available online.) November 10, 2014, archived from the original on October 22, 2016 ; accessed on October 22, 2016 .
  2. ^ Mauro Zafalon: Odebrecht investirá com força no álcool . In: Folha de S. Paulo . June 27, 2007 ( online ).
  3. ^ Anne Vigna: Odebrecht builds Brazil. The state's profitable alliance with a large corporation that has become a global player as a family business . In: Le Monde diplomatique . October 11, 2013, p. 14-15 ( online ).
  4. ^ Biography Emílio Odebrecht. (No longer available online.) Archived from the original on October 24, 2005 ; accessed on October 22, 2016 .

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Odebrecht, Emílio
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Odebrecht, Emil
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Brazilian engineer and businessman
DATE OF BIRTH December 18, 1894
PLACE OF BIRTH Santa Catarina , Brazil
DATE OF DEATH 22nd August 1962
Place of death Salvador , Bahia , Brazil