Heinrich Adolph Meyer

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Heinrich Adolph Meyer (born September 11, 1822 in Hamburg , † May 1, 1889 in Forsteck near Kiel ) was a German manufacturer, oceanographer and politician .

Life

At the age of 16 Heinrich Adolph joined his father's company, the stick manufacturer Heinrich Christian Meyer , whom everyone had just called "Stockmeyer", and learned all the work processes in what was then the largest and most modern factory in Hamburg, the first Times in the history of the Hanseatic city that steam power was used industrially. Only a few years later, in 1841, Stockmeyer sent him to the United States of America to found a subsidiary near New York to produce whalebone products for the American market. After Heinrich Adolph had solved this task to the satisfaction of his father, he left America in 1844 and returned to Hamburg. When Stockmeyer died four years later, Heinrich Adolph and his brother-in-law Friedrich Traun took over the management of the company in 1848, which his younger brother Heinrich Christian also joined shortly afterwards.

When the American Charles Goodyear filed a patent for the manufacture of hard rubber in 1850 , there were fears that this new product could be a considerable competitor for the traditional whalebone. The company therefore acquired the patent in 1851 and made numerous experiments with it in the following years. These experiments showed that hard rubber could in no way displace whalebone from the market, but they made it clear that it was excellent for making combs.

In 1856 the younger brother Heinrich Christian founded the "Harburger Gummi-Kamm-Compagnie" together with Johannes Bücking and HW Maurien, which became the company HC Meyer jr. belonged to. Heinrich Adolph left the company in 1864 and founded his own company for ivory products in Hamburg-Barmbek. He maintained an office in Zanzibar , from where large caravans were sent into the interior of Africa. Almost nine years later, in 1873, he accepted his brother-in-law Heinrich Westendarp into the management and finally handed over the entire business to him in 1889.

Heinrich Adolph Meyer was not only a successful manufacturer, he was also politically active and was a member of the Constituent Assembly ( Hamburg Constituent Assembly ) for Hamburg in 1848/49 . In the Reichstag election in 1877 and the Reichstag election in 1878 , which took place a year later , he was elected member of the Reichstag in the constituency of Schleswig-Holstein 3 (Schleswig - Eckernförde) , of which he was a member of the German Progressive Party until 1881 .

Meyer's real interest, however, was in marine research. Although he had not completed a proper university degree, he wrote - often together with Karl August Möbius - remarkable books on the animal population in the Bay of Kiel and on snails and mussels in the Baltic Sea . He was particularly concerned with the physical properties of the sea. He found that the temperature and the salinity of the Baltic Sea were subject to considerable fluctuations from year to year and that the fish stocks in this inland sea depended on them in a special way. In his day there were no comparable studies on which he could have drawn. For this reason Meyer developed a completely new observation and measurement method. From Kiel to Helsingør in Denmark he set up observation stations and made small research trips to the Belt himself . Heinrich Adolph had developed the devices he used himself. In 1869 the Prussian state set up a commission to investigate German seas and elected him to be its chairman. He was also a member of the board of directors of the zoological garden in Hamburg and received the academic degree of Dr. from Kiel University as early as 1866 for his services to marine research. phil hc awarded. In 1866 he was elected a member of the Leopoldina .

Villa Forsteck (around 1895)

Meyer had a large, hospitable house built near Kiel, to which he and his wife Marie invited high-ranking artists and scientists. Theodor Fontane wrote a poem about the Forsteck family and even left an unfinished story about it. The guests also included the pianist Clara Schumann , the composer Johannes Brahms , the writer Klaus Groth and the interior minister of the USA, Carl Schurz , who was a brother-in-law of the hostess. The house was badly damaged in a bombing raid in 1944 and demolished except for a few visible remains of the wall; The Kiel Diederichsenpark was laid out on the site in 1957 .

Works

  • The hind gill or Opistobranchia d. Bay of Kiel 1865 (together with Karl Möbius)
  • The fauna of the Bay of Kiel (1865) Investigations into the physical conditions of the western part of the Baltic Sea (1871)
  • The Prosobranchia and Lamelibranchia of the Bay of Kiel (1872 together with K. Möbius)
  • On the physics of the sea, observations on ocean currents, temperature and specific gravity of the sea water during the North Sea voyage from July 21 to September 9, 1872, 1874
  • Periodic fluctuations in the salinity in the surface water of the Baltic Sea and the North Sea (1885)
  • Ivory, Hamburg 1889
  • Memories of Heinrich Christian Meyer. Collected for the family by his son. Hamburg, self-published, 1887.
  • Memories of Dr. HA Meyer. According to his own records. Hamburg, self-published, 1890.
  • Memories of Heinrich Christian Meyer -Stockmeyer-. Collected for the family by Heinrich Ad. Meyer. Hamburg 1900

literature

  • E. Alberti, Lex of the Schleswig-Holstein-Lauenburg and Eutinian writers from 1866–1882. 2nd volume, Kiel 1886, pp. 33-34
  • Charitas Bischoff, pictures from my life. Berlin 1912
  • Charitas Bischoff, snapshots from a youth's life. Leipzig 1905
  • Charitas Bischoff, Amalie Dietrich. One Life.Hamm 1952
  • Sebastian A. Gerlach, Heinrich Adolph Meyer (1822–1889) and the "Marie", Kiel's first research cutter (1862). In: DGM-Mitteilungen 1/2000, pp. 6–8
  • James E. Haas, Conrad Poppenhusen. The Life of a German-American Industrial Pioneer. Baltimore 2004
  • Albert Hänel, Am Sarge, Forsteck, May 2, 1889. Farewell words from Dr. Albert Hänel. In: Memories of Dr. HA Meyer (1890), pp. 119-124
  • Inge Hinrichsen, Aunt Tine tells us. The story of a Hamburg family. Erlangen 2006
  • G. Karsten, A Brief Outline of Heinrich Adolph Meyer's Scientific Activities In: Memories of Dr. HA Meyer (1890) pp. 109-118.
  • Dieter Rednak:  Meyer, Heinrich Adolph. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 17, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1994, ISBN 3-428-00198-2 , p. 294 f. ( Digitized version ).
  • Dieter Rednak, Heinrich Christian Meyer (1797–1848) - called "Stockmeyer" - from craftsman to industrialist. A Biedermeier career. Hamburg 1992
  • Annelore Rieke-Müller, Lothar Dittrich , The lion roars next door. The establishment of zoological gardens in the German-speaking area 1833–1869. Cologne and Vienna 1998
  • Herbert Weidner, The beginnings of marine biological and ecological research in Hamburg by Karl Möbius (1825–1908) and Heinrich Adolph Meyer (1822–1889). In: Historisch marinekundliches Jahrbuch 2, Berlin 1994
  • Gerd Stolz, people and events - memorial plaques in Kiel. Husum 2001
  • Gerd Stolz, Heinrich Adolph Meyer and his "Haus Forsteck" in Kiel. Husum 2004

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Fritz Specht, Paul Schwabe: The Reichstag elections from 1867 to 1903. Statistics of the Reichstag elections together with the programs of the parties and a list of the elected representatives. 2nd Edition. Carl Heymann Verlag, Berlin 1904, pp. 108-109.
  2. ^ In January 1856 - Johannes Brahms' first concert in Kiel. (No longer available online.) City of Kiel, archived from the original on December 14, 2012 ; Retrieved September 29, 2012 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.kiel.de

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Meyer, Heinrich Adolph
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German marine researcher, manufacturer and politician, MdR
DATE OF BIRTH September 11, 1822
PLACE OF BIRTH Hamburg
DATE OF DEATH May 1, 1889
Place of death Forsteck near Kiel