Fritz Melsheimer

Friedrich Karl "Fritz" Melsheimer (born September 18, 1887 in Maring-Siebenborn ; † May 21, 1967 ibid) was a German winery owner and German district administrator in the district of Zell (Mosel) .

Life

Fritz was a son of the mill owner Franz Carl Melsheimer and his wife Barbara Theresia geb. Leixerant from Siebenborn. After his matriculation examination in 1907, he in Saarbrücken had taken, he studied 1908-1911 jurisprudence in Munich , Bonn and finally at the Ruprecht-Karls-University of Heidelberg where he in 1912 until his state examination took off with his inaugural dissertation "How is it possible to dispose of the estate in any other way than by disposition upon death? ” to the Dr. jur. received his doctorate . He had completed his legal clerkship in Brussels . During the First and Second World Wars , Melsheimer served as an officer , was most recently captain and battalion commander and was awarded the Iron Cross 1st class.

In 1920 he left the judicial service at his own request, moved to Traben-Trarbach and took over his uncle Max Melsheimer's winery - the Oskar Graff company. Since Max Melsheimer had no children of his own, he appointed Fritz Melsheimer as heir as early as 1910. After the death of Max Melsheimer in 1929 and the death of his stepson Oskar Graff from his first marriage in 1930, the entire fortune of both families passed into the hands of Fritz Melsheimer.

In 1923 he took up his first communal activities and became a member of the city council and municipal alderman of Traben-Trarbach. From 1923 he began to get involved as a representative of the wine trade in local politics and thus became a member of the district council and, from 1925, also a member and alderman of the city council. In 1929 he took over the chairmanship of the list "Vintners, Industry and Commerce". From 1930 to 1933, as a national conservative politician, he was co-founder and district leader of the Mosel branch in the Bund des Stahlhelm and until 1933 a member of the district council and the district committee. In March 1933 he was re-elected to the district council and the city council.

In May 1933 he was only replaced as First Alderman and in May 1934 he had to resign from this mandate together with the city ​​councilors who did not belong to the NSDAP . From April to July 1945 he was mayor of Traben-Trarbach and after the end of the war the American military government appointed the lawyer Melsheimer in the summer of 1945 as district administrator for the Zell district. In 1948, after winning an absolute majority, he was re-elected to the Traben-Trarbach city council as leader of the “Free Voters Group M”. Due to the great importance it gave to the wine industry, this group of voters proved to be extremely effective until the 1950s.

In 1950 Melsheimer was appointed honorary citizenship of Traben-Trarbach for his meritorious activities. In 1952 he became a member of the Rhineland-Palatinate Constitutional Court and in 1960 he finally resigned all of his voluntary activities in his hometown and in the district.

On August 20, 1913, Fritz Melsheimer married Hubertina Hilda Müller (1892–1953) from Trarbach in Mönchengladbach , who was a daughter of the court counselor Cornelius Müller. After the death of his first wife, he married Anita Niles in 1961. Fritz Horst Melsheimer , a manager from Traben-Trarbach, is a grandson of Fritz Melsheimer .

Memberships and activities

• 1948–1960 member of the Traben-Trarbach city council
• Since 1949 head of the finance committee of the Chamber of Agriculture
• Chairman of the district farmers 'and winegrowers' association in Zell
• Member of the district council and the district committee as well as district deputy
• 1952 assessor at the Rhineland-Palatinate Constitutional Court
• Honorary member of the German Viticulture Association
• Member of the executive committee of the Rhineland-Nassau farmers and winegrowers' association

Awards

• Iron Cross 1st class
• 1950 honorary citizen of the city of Traben-Trarbach
• Federal Cross of Merit 1st class
• Freiherr vom Stein plaque (Rhineland-Palatinate)
• 1960 Golden chamber badge from the Chamber of Agriculture

literature

• Heinz-Günther Böse and Alfons Friderichs (Eds.): Melsheimer, Dr. Friedrich Karl (Fritz) . In: Personalities of the Cochem-Zell District, Kliomedia, Trier 2004, ISBN 3-89890-084-3 , p. 233 f.
• Heinz Monz (Ed.): Melsheimer, Friedrich Karl (Fritz) in: Trier Biographisches Lexikon Wissenschaftlicher Verlag Trier, 2000, ISBN 3-88476-400-4 , p. 290 f.
• Wolfgang Sartor, Michael Willkomm (eds.): The history of the Moselle wine trade from 1700 to 1918 , Graff-Melsheimer , Kliomedia, Trier 2018, ISBN 978-3-89890-149-9 , pp. 179–187.

Web links

• Entry on Fritz Melsheimer in the Rhineland-Palatinate personal database