Groten Tower
The Groten Tower is a listed building that was built in 1869 and shaped the cityscape in the old town of Arnsberg .
Building background
The publisher and printer Heinrich F. Grote published the Arnsberger Wochenblatt as early as 1820 and later, among other things, the official gazette for the Arnsberg district . As early as the 1830s, he was one of the richest people in Arnsberg. Later he was one of the co-founders of the Cosack paper mill.
The boom in his printing business in the 1860s required an expansion of the area. The plans from 1868 envisaged the construction of a building that would serve both residential purposes and house the printing plant. A steam boiler system for energy generation should be installed upstream . After the plans were approved, construction began. For this purpose, a brick factory was built on the Schreppenberg.
Building description
The building was built into the old city wall . The lower part was used to accommodate the operating facilities. In this part the walls are partly meters thick. The walled-up archway in the lower part, which is still visible today, was later mistakenly viewed as the remainder of the old bridge gate. In fact, it is the rounding for the steam boiler passage in the boiler house . Above the print shop in the basement, there were office and storage rooms connected by an elevator. Above it was Grote's private apartment. A large Söller allowed remarkable views of the Ruhr valley . The servants 'and employees' quarters were located in the attic.
The building is built in a neo-Gothic style as a result of the Herdringer castle building. It is a tower-like, plastered solid building with a crowning of a crenellated wreath on consoles and stepped gables on all sides. The tent roof is also remarkable . Dragon figures were used to divert rainwater. The neighboring Hotel Landsberger Hof was also originally built in a neo-Gothic style. In Arnsberg one spoke of "castles of a civil kind."
Another story
The printing works had to file for bankruptcy in 1878 because Grote, as a supporter of the Center Party , lost government contracts as a result of the culture war . The printer Becker from Lüdenscheid took over the printing machines and the delivery orders, but relocated the printing shop to the current premises on Rumbecker Straße. The businessman Grüneberg-Schüler bought the tower with the still existing steam boiler system. This was later enlarged and served to drive a steam mill that existed until 1896.
After the building was foreclosed, the rooms were rented out for residential purposes. Between 1904 and 1921 the building housed a branch of the Reichsbank . The directors lived with their families in Grote's earlier apartment.
After that, the building was used for residential purposes again. The Jewish wife of a teacher at the Laurentianum grammar school living there was harassed during the Nazi era and later deported to the Theresienstadt concentration camp . The husband was interrogated several times by the Gestapo and was temporarily arrested. Both survived the persecution and returned to Arnsberg after the war. During the Second World War , the building was damaged by bombs.
Later repaired in a makeshift manner, the then owner had the building repaired and painted in 1960. In 1982 he was entered in the list of monuments of the city of Arnsberg (DL 71).
literature
- Uwe Haltaufderheide: The architectural monuments of the city of Arnsberg. Collection period 1980–1990. City of Arnsberg , Arnsberg 1990, ISBN 3-928394-01-0 p. 64f
- Klemens Pröpper: Groten Turm: Printing. Steam mill and Reichsbank. In: Arnsberger Heimatbund (Ed.): 750 years of Arnsberg. Arnsberg, 1989, pp. 569-572
Coordinates: 51 ° 23 '47.8 " N , 8 ° 3' 51.3" E