Heinrich von Brunck

Heinrich von Brunck

Obituary from his friend Carl Glaser

Heinrich Brunck , since 1905 Heinrich Ritter von Brunck (born March 26, 1847 in Winterborn , † December 4, 1911 in Ludwigshafen am Rhein ) was a German chemist.

Life

Brunck was born in 1847 as the youngest son of the landowner, lawyer and member of the state parliament Friedrich Karl Brunck and his wife Elisabeth, née. Ritter born in Winterborn . After attending elementary school, he studied at the Kaiserslautern trade school from 1860 and at the technical college for chemistry at the Zurich Polytechnic from 1863 . In 1864/65 he studied at the University of Tübingen , where he became a member of the Corps Suevia . In Ghent he studied with Friedrich August Kekulé in 1865 and 1866 , where he came into contact with Wilhelm Körner and Carl Leverkus . At Koerner and later at Strecker and Städel in Tübingen, Brunck wrote his dissertation on substituted nitrophenols, which he presented in 1867 .

Through the mediation of Carl Glaser , Brunck got his first job as an industrial chemist at de Haën in (Hanover) List in 1867. In 1869 he moved to the still quite small aniline factory in Ludwigshafen. Alongside Friedrich Engelhorn , Heinrich Caro , Carl Clemm and Carl Glaser, Brunck soon became one of the most important personalities at what would later become BASF .

In 1871 he married Emilie Barbara Wilhelmine born in Großkarlbach . Fitting, a daughter of the local landowner Christian Fitting and Henriette, geb. Knight.

Employment at BASF

Brunck was initially entrusted with the production of pure benzene and toluene (separation by distillation) at the aniline factory, and from 1870 also with the production of chloral. His good knowledge of French enabled him to make trade contacts in France at an early stage. In 1873, BASF took over the Heinrich Siegle company, which mainly produced inorganic pigments in Stuttgart and Duisburg. Brunck was now employed in Duisburg to organize the production of raw anthracene . However, the process was not very economical and was soon discontinued. In 1875 Brunck went to England to study tar production there. He was able to establish contacts with an English company that mined pebbles in Spain and thus expanded the use of the Duisburg works for the production of copper (Duisburger Kupferhütte AG).

In 1876 Brunck went back to Ludwigshafen to oversee the production of anthracene and anthraquinone . Brunck also took over the management of synthesis gas production. Until 1884 he was also entrusted with the expansion of the alizarin paint production at BASF (good contacts with Carl Graebe). Brunck recognized the value of alizarin dyes for dyeing wool early on. On January 1, 1884, Brunck became director and company director of BASF alongside Heinrich Caro , Carl Glaser , G. Siegle (commercial director). In addition to the alizarin production, Brunck was also in charge of construction and machine management as well as the welfare facilities of the plant.

With his new colleague René Bohn , Brunck was able to greatly expand the range of alizarin colors, and a good process for the production of phthalic acid from naphthalene was found. Brunck was also able to introduce economical synthesis processes for benzaldehyde and benzoic acid.

When building the first indigo synthesis plant based on a synthesis route by Adolf Baeyer under the direction of Heinrich Caro, however, Brunck remained very skeptical about its economic success. The investment costs were high, the quality was not yet sufficient, and the yield was low. In fact, the losses from indigo synthesis initially grew from year to year. It was not until 1898 that Heumann and Pfleger discovered a very good synthesis route for indigo. Brunck played a major role in the successful, large-scale implementation of indigo production.

Under the technical direction of Brunck, Rudolf Knietsch developed a process for liquefying chlorine at BASF. Knietsch also developed the contact process for the production of sulfuric acid .

From 1890 onwards, Brunck also introduced electrochemical and electrothermal processes. The production of calcium carbide and calcium cyanamide (fertilizers) and chlorine (electrolytically) were important. The oxidation of atmospheric nitrogen to nitric acid was also the focus of Brunck's work. The Norwegians Kristian Birkeland and Samuel Eyde had successfully used an electric flame arc to produce nitric acid from atmospheric nitrogen. Norway also offered advantages because of the hydropower that could be used to generate electricity.

In 1901 Brunck became chairman of the board.

From 1908 the production of ammonia from atmospheric nitrogen appeared possible, the first work was undertaken by Fritz Haber . Brunck commissioned Carl Bosch with Fritz Haber to develop a technical solution for ammonia synthesis - the later Haber-Bosch process .

Brunck himself resigned as general director in 1906, but held the position of chairman of the supervisory board until his death.

Lord of the castle in Kirchheimbolanden

Grave of Heinrich von Brunck (left) in the castle garden in Kirchheimbolanden

From 1884 onwards, Brunck's older brother, a member of the Reichstag and honorary mayor of Kirchheimbolanden, took over the Kirchheimboland castle before Heinrich Brunck, in 1889 the sole owner of the castle, the castle garden and the former ballroom in Kirchheimbolanden . He freed the former palace garden, which was used as an agricultural area, and had it rebuilt. He commissioned the Siesmayer brothers from Frankfurt am Main for the gardens . The most famous work of the horticultural company is the Frankfurt Palmengarten, created from 1869. The exquisite trees were verifiably bought from tree nurseries in Schleswig-Holstein, Saxony and Bohemia, or he procured them on his various trips. In the end there are said to have been 64 different tree genera, of which 50 different genera in numerous species were preserved by the end of the 20th century. The garden is still considered one of the most beautiful English landscape parks in south-west Germany.

Father of corporate social welfare

Even today he is still considered the father of corporate social welfare at BASF , having had an entire residential area built for his workers in Ludwigshafen. In 1892 he had a lung sanatorium built near Dannenfels for sick followers - at that time the world's first sanatorium of its kind. He died on December 4, 1911 in Ludwigshafen. He found his final resting place in the palace garden of Kirchheimbolanden. He bequeathed his property, including his house and property, to a BASF foundation. His property, located by the castle park, was later demolished by the foundation in order to build a rest home for employees. But this construction was never carried out.

The first single houses for working-class families were built in the I., II. And III. Gartenweg, between Leuschnerstrasse in the west and Rollesstrasse in the east. The non-profit housing construction company BASF GmbH (Gewoge) is still responsible for the housing construction of BASF employees.

Honors

In 1905 Heinrich von Brunck was raised to the nobility and two years later appointed to the secret council of commerce .

The Dr.-Heinrich-von-Brunck-Strasse in Kirchheimbolanden, the Brunckstrasse in the Maxdorfer BASF-Siedlung and the Brunckviertel in Ludwigshafen are named after him. The Dr. Heinrich von Brunck Memorial Foundation is now part of the BASF Social Foundation . The Heinrich v. The Brunck Foundation is now part of the Fund for the Promotion of the Humanities of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences .

Heinrich von Brunck is an honorary citizen of Kirchheimbolanden.

In his birthplace Winterborn (Palatinate) in the community of Alsenz-Obermoschel, the Dr.-Heinrich-von-Brunck-Halle was named after him.

literature

• Karl Saftien:  Brunck, Heinrich von. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 2, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1955, ISBN 3-428-00183-4 , p. 677 ( digitized version ).

swell

1. ↑ Suevia-Tübingen 1831-19031 . Volume 2: Members, p. 62 (No. 207).
2. ↑ Hans DÖHN "KIRCHHEIMBOLANDEN" The history of the city 1968, published by the city of Kirchheimbolanden 1968: page 208 line 7 page 213 ff. EXPANSION of the RESIDENCE Fig. 145 and text up to page 214 line 6
3. ^ "Die BASF" Eine Unternehmensgeschichte, CH Beck, Munich 2002, ISBN 3-406-49526-5 , page 78, 4th line from the bottom; Page 110, 2nd paragraph ff. And page 422 ff.
4. ↑ BASF Sozialstiftung ( Memento of the original from November 28, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) 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.  
5. ↑ [1]