Heinrich Anton Petersen

Heinrich Anton Petersen (born December 12, 1745 in Holzminden , † August 25, 1798 in Wolfenbüttel ) was a German theologian and educator .

Life

Heinrich Anton Petersen was born in Holzminden in 1745, according to other sources in 1743. He attended the local monastery and city school and then studied theology in Göttingen from 1766 . After his return in 1770 he worked at the Holzminden School as a collaborator and from 1777 as the rector. Before 1777 he had been appointed prior of the Amelungsborn monastery . In 1760 the monastery school there was relocated to Holzminden by Duke Karl I and merged with the local city school. Petersen became director of the school in 1785. In 1790 he was appointed consistorial councilor and in 1793 general superintendent in Wolfenbüttel. Petersen died in Wolfenbüttel in 1798.

The failed school reform

Petersen's childhood friend, the writer and philanthropically oriented pedagogue Joachim Heinrich Campe , was appointed in 1786 by Duke Karl Wilhelm Ferdinand to head a school directorate in Braunschweig. Campe was supposed to reform the school system in the Duchy of Braunschweig together with the board members Konrad Heusinger , Johann Stuve and Ernst Christian Trapp . The newly established school directorate was to replace the supervision of the schools by the consistory as the highest church administrative authority. The school in Holzminden was selected in 1787 as the first school in the duchy to attempt reform. The project was ended three years later and the consistory received back the school supervision from the school directorate, which was dissolved in 1790. Ultimately, the attempt at reform failed because of a coalition of conservative class representatives from the nobility and clergy. However, Petersen was appointed to the consistorial council and was able to try to act in a reformist way. He campaigned for the training of rural school teachers, but also met with strong opposition.

Petersen published sermons and school programs.

literature

• Britta Berg: Petersen, (Johann) Heinrich Anton . In: Horst-Rüdiger Jarck , Dieter Lent et al. (Ed.): Braunschweigisches Biographisches Lexikon - 8th to 18th century . Appelhans Verlag, Braunschweig 2006, ISBN 3-937664-46-7 , p. 558 .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Peter Albrecht: The Age of Enlightened Absolutism (1735-1806) . In: Horst-Rüdiger Jarck, Gerhard Schildt (Hrsg.): Braunschweigische Landesgeschichte. A region looking back over the millennia. Appelhans Verlag, Braunschweig 2000, p. 608.