Gustav Richard Fischer

Fischer around 1905

The fisherman's hut in Ilmenau

Fischer's grave in the Ilmenau cemetery

Gustav Richard Fischer (born August 28, 1862 in Pößneck ; † May 13, 1921 in Ilmenau ) was a German entrepreneur and industrialist .

Life

Gustav Fischer was born in the East Thuringian textile town of Pößneck in 1862 as the ninth child of a tanner . After attending elementary school in Pößneck, he began an apprenticeship with a shopkeeper in Freiberg , where he learned the trade of a businessman . Later he went to Leipzig and became a partner in a coffee importing company, which enabled him to gain a certain wealth. It was there that he met his future wife, Martha Lommatzsch, whom he married in 1889.

In 1893 Fischer moved with his wife to Ilmenau , where he became a partner in Sophienhütte , a large glassworks , and learned various skills in the glazing trade. In 1907 there were significant differences between Fischer and the main owner of the Sophienhütte, Richard Bock, which prompted him to leave the hut and set up his own glassworks in Ilmenau. He bought a piece of land in Langewiesener Strasse in Ilmenau, where construction work on the new glassworks began in 1907. In 1910 the " Fischerhütte " could then be inaugurated.

Fischer manufactured products in his glassworks that were very similar to those of the Schott-Glaswerke in Jena , they even bore a trademark that resembled Schott's, namely two stripes, one red and one blue. Schott AG then sued Fischer. The process was conducted through three instances and ended up before the Reichsgericht , which decided that Fischer could continue to use the two strips, which were similar to the Schottschen.

Gustav Richard Fischer was respected by his workers. He maintained a good relationship with them and was considered social, but also very precise. Fischer attached great importance to quality in the manufacture of its glassware. He declined the advice of his confidants to enlarge the factory after the First World War . He was a member of the Ilmenau Gabelbach Association and was close to the liberal parties. Shortly before his death, he planned the construction of his “retirement home” in Naumannstrasse on the Ilm in the villa district of Ilmenau. Construction work for this was supposed to begin in the summer of 1921, but Fischer died on May 13, 1921 of complications from pneumonia . He was buried in the Ilmenau cemetery.

Fischer and his wife Martha had three children: Friedrich Karl Alexander (died at the age of four) as well as Hellmuth (born 1901) and Martin (born 1903), who after his death became partners in the glassworks, which at that time employed around 150 people.