Emil Pfeifer

This article deals with the entrepreneur Emil Pfeifer. For other people see Emil Pfeiffer .

Emil Pfeifer (1806–1889), born in Amsterdam

Emil Pfeifer (born November 8, 1806 in Amsterdam , † September 20, 1889 in Mehlem (today Bonn )) was a German entrepreneur and pioneer of sugar manufacturing in the Rhineland and a German entrepreneur in the engine industry ( Deutz gas engine factory ). The Pfeifer & Langen company has been family-owned since it was founded.

Emil Pfeifer is buried in the family grave of the Melatenfriedhof in Cologne (HWG NS between Lit E and F, grave number 119-122).

family

Emil Pfeifer was born in Amsterdam as the fourth child of the merchant and shipowner Valentin Pfeifer (1763–1840) . His mother Maria Agnes, née Weyll, (1772–1856), was the daughter of the Cologne shipper Johann Christian Weyll (1724–1798) and his wife Anna Katharina, née Hofbauer, (1732–1819) from Mainz.

Emil Pfeifer's siblings were:

• Maria ("Mimi") Georgina (1797–1863) married the merchant Wilhelm Kiderlen (1798-1870) from Württemberg in 1822 in Amsterdam. The family grave is located in the main cemetery in Frankfurt am Main (Gewann F - No. 423). The grave is under monument protection ( list of cultural monuments in the main cemetery in Frankfurt ). Since 9/2019 sponsored by the M. Pfeifer family. Restoration 2019.

• Valentin (1804–1833) was the owner of a paper mill in Oberschneidhausen (formerly ironworks) near Düren ; he remained unmarried. Valentin was buried in the cemetery in Brühl .

• Robert ("Robertus") (1808–1877), a merchant in Antwerp , married Maria Wilhelmine André (1815–1876) in Paris in 1834, born in Frankenthal / Pfalz. Her daughter Agnes Hoesch , née Pfeifer (1839–1903), married the ironworks owner Eberhard Hoesch from Düren in 1862 . The Pfeifer couple are buried in Antwerp.

• Lilla (1813–1868), married the son of the Frankfurt merchant Franz Dominicus Brentano , Georg Franz Melchior Brentano (1801–1852) in 1836 . The two called themselves Brentano-Pfeifer after their marriage; they had 7 children: Agnes (1837–1916), Johanna (1839–1885), Franz (1840–1888), Maria (1842–1867), Josefa (1844–1875), Emil (1845–1890) and Louise (1848 -1866). The couple is buried in the main cemetery in Frankfurt (Gruftenhalle / Brentano-Gruft No. 48). The grave is a listed building.

• Eugen (1816–1896), owner of a country estate in Erbach / Rheingau and owner of the Dächheim estate in Theilheim , near Schweinfurt, from 1845 to 1896. Eugen was the family chronicler and not married. He last lived in his house at Gutleutstrasse 34 in Frankfurt am Main. Eugen is buried next to his parents in the main cemetery (Gewann B - No. 128). The grave is under monument protection ( list of cultural monuments in the main cemetery in Frankfurt ). Since 10/2018 sponsored by the M. Pfeifer family. Restored in June / July 2019.

Two brothers, Albert Johann (1802–1803) and Oscar (1812–1815) died as small children; they are buried in Amsterdam.

Emil Pfeifer was married twice, first to Maria Emma , born in 1833 . Hoesch (1814–1845), daughter of Düren and Schneidhausen paper manufacturer Ludolph Mathias Hoesch (1788–1859) and his wife Juliane, born. Schleicher (1793-1868). There were two children from this marriage:

• Maria ("Marie") Agnes Julie Pfeifer (1834–1920) married the mining and smelting entrepreneur Gustav Adolf Hoesch (1818–1885) in 1857

• Valentin Pfeifer (1837–1909) married Hedwig Amalie Adelheid, born in Berlin, in 1866. Matzerath (1843-1911)

From Emil's second marriage in 1847 with Josephine Charlotte Lucie Mayer (1823-1893), the youngest daughter of the Düren Oberbergrats Johann Heinrich Daniel Mayer († 1836) and his wife Philipine, née. Jardou, originate from:

• Eugen (1848–1915), sugar manufacturer and landowner, he was also chairman of the Association of German Refineries and a shareholder in Gasmotoren-Fabrik Deutz AG , where he was also on the supervisory board. In 1876 he married Paula Maria Schnitzler (1855–1949), daughter of the government councilor Robert Schnitzler and his wife Clara, geb. Schmidt. Eugen and Paula Maria had four children: Clara Emilie Emma Caroline (1877 – around 1950); Emma Maria (1879 – around 1960); Anna Johanna (1882-1975); Emma Agnes Robertine (1883-1884). Eugen lived with his family in Friesdorf near Bonn, in Annaberg Castle (Friesdorf) , which was called "Tusculum" in the family. With a foundation he established the construction of a children's school (called Paula-Maria-Stift) in Friesdorf.

• Emma (1852–1855) died at the age of three

• Johanna Lucia Franziska (1857–1934) married Alfred Gescher (1844–1932 ) in 1884 , who later became the district president of Münster

Valentin Pfeifer (1763–1840), born in Sommerau

Memorial at the cemetery in Sommerau, erected on April 24, 2019

Valentin Pfeifer (1837–1909) supported the construction of the New Sommerau parish church of St. Laurentius in 1906 with generous donations in memory of grandfather Valentin Pfeifer (1763–1840), who was born in Sommerau in 1763. In 1907 he was made an honorary citizen of the community of Sommerau . Valentin's siblings, Maria Agnes Hoesch (1834–1920), Eugen Pfeifer (1848–1915) and Johanna von Gescher (1857–1934) also contributed to the Sommerau church project with donations. Since April 24, 2019, a memorial in the Sommerau cemetery has been commemorating the benefactors and their grandfather.

Live and act

After attending school in Heidelberg at the Kurfürst-Friedrich-Gymnasium and Amsterdam as well as commercial internships, he first studied metallurgy at the Bergakademie Freiberg , then until 1830 mechanical engineering, chemistry with philosophy at the Kaiserliche Wilhelmsuniversität Berlin .

Emil's older brother Valentin Pfeifer (1804–1833) had, with capital from his father, acquired a former ironworks on the Rur, Oberschneidhausen near Düren around 1830 and converted it into a paper mill. Emil initially became a partner in the company. His sick brother transferred the property to him shortly before his death in 1833. Emil sold the business shortly after his father's death in 1840 and moved to Cologne. Here he acted u. a. with indigo and speculated very successfully in various fields with his and his father's inherited wealth.

At the end of 1840 Emil acquired the Frohnhof estate near Ossendorf near Cologne, now Cologne-Ossendorf . It was still leased at that time. Around 1850 Emil experimented with the cultivation and processing of beetroot on Gut Fronhof. Here he founded the first beet sugar factory on the Rhine in 1851 together with August Joest, son of Carl Joest, the founder of the "Carl Joest & Sons" refinery, since 1831 in Cologne. Two years later, Emil is the sole owner ("Emil Pfeifer et Cop.") And in 1865 takes on his son Valentin Pfeifer as a partner. This was the beginning of the Rhenish beet sugar industry . Previously, the Cologne factories had limited themselves to processing colonial cane sugar . In 1865 he hired the engineer Eugen Langen , the son of Johann Jakob Langens , as technical manager and founded sugar factories with him in 1870 in the Bördenlandscape, first in Elsdorf and in 1879 in Euskirchen under the name " Pfeifer & Langen ". Around 1880 the Elsdorf plant was regarded as an international “model institute” and, together with the output from Euskirchen, it becomes the largest sugar company in West Germany.

Together with his son Valentin and Eugen Langen, he took a stake in the Deutz gas engine factory in 1872 , of which he was chairman of the supervisory board until his death. He was also involved in the Cologne city council from 1868 to 1877 as a member of the National Liberal Party . In 1881 he was appointed to the Commerce Council. In 1884 he established the "Pfeifer Foundation" within the Cologne grammar school and foundation fund .

literature

• Heinrich Philip Bartels: 100 years of Pfeifer & Langen (1870–1970) . Pfeifer & Langen, Cologne 1970.
• Klara van Eyll :  Pfeifer, Emil. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 20, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 2001, ISBN 3-428-00201-6 , p. 312 f. ( Digitized version ).
• Klara van Eyll: Entrepreneurs of the Cologne Sugar Industry (1830–1871) , in: Cologne Entrepreneurs and Early Industrialization in the Rhineland and in Westphalia (1835–1871) , 1984, pp. 193–207
• Klara van Eyll: Emil Pfeifer (1806-1889). In: Cologne entrepreneurs in the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries. (= Rheinisch-Westfälische Wirtschaftsbiographien, Volume 12). Aschendorff, Münster 1986, pp. 136–157.
• Heinrich Philip Bartels: Chronicle of the Pfeifer family , around 1975 (only published in the family circle)
• Otto Pfeifer: Historical house book of Sommerau. Hinckel-Druck, Wertheim, ed. Markt Eschau, self-published, 2010.
• Otto Pfeifer: The history of the parish and the churches of St. Laurentius Sommerau. Hinckel-Druck, Wertheim, ed. Markt Eschau, self-published, 2012.
• Otto Pfeifer: Chronicle of the Pfeifer Sommerau family. , Self-published, 2017.
• Godesberger Heimatblätter, Issue 23 (1985), pages 153-172, The Paula-Maria-Stift in Friesdorf by employee Adolf Berchem, Association for Homeland Care and Local History Bad Godesberg.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ http://www.schlossarchiv.de/haeuser/d/DA/E/Daechheim.htm
2. ↑ Entry at Straßen Friesdorf of the VHH Bad Godesberg (accessed September 2015)