Henry Janssen

Henry Janssen , maiden name Henry Janssen (* 8. February 1866 in Barmen ; † 28. January 1948 in Wyomissing ) was a German American Textile Machinery - entrepreneurs .

Life

Janssen, son of the printer and bookseller Albert Janssen and his wife Helene geb. Benner from Nassau began an apprenticeship as a machine fitter in 1881 , with the focus on agricultural machines. In 1888 he emigrated to the USA and on his arrival in New York immediately found a job as a machinist in the Castle Braid Company knitwear factory in Brooklyn . A year later he was manager of the machine park.

In 1891 Janssen met Ferdinand Thun from Barmen, with whom he quickly became friends. They had a common interest in textile machines, so in 1892 they opened a small workshop for the manufacture of braiding machines in Reading, Pennsylvania, under the name Textile Machine Works, Thun & Janssen . Their relationship with the workforce was based on mutual trust, so that they were soon seen as social entrepreneurs. They developed machines for the production of packing cords and suspender tape. In 1896 they moved the company to Wyomissing . In 1899 the company received an award at the Philadelphia National Export Show . In 1900 they founded the Narrow Fabric Company to manufacture the Barmer articles . In 1906 they set up the Berkshire Knitting Mills for the manufacture of women's stockings from cotton , later also from silk and synthetic fibers using machines from their Textile Machine Works . The machine parts were manufactured in our own foundry . Janssen always played the role of the technically and economically driving entrepreneur.

1936-1937 was the work of the American Federation of Hosiery Workers on strike for 13 months, the workers union organizing. There were injuries and the death of worker M. Earl Schlegel, but the plant was never unionized.

From the University of Heidelberg Janssen received the honorary doctorate for the care of German-American relations. In the years after the First World War and the Second World War , Janssen helped his homeland Barmen socially and economically with advice and support from the Ahr, Krath & Co. in Wuppertal-Barmen, which worked with the American Nuplax Corporation in Reading, Pa. was connected. Henry-Janssen-Strasse in Barmen is reminiscent of Janssen .

literature

• Walter Dietz: Ferdinand Thun and Henry Janssen . In: Wuppertal Biographies 1st episode . Contributions to the history and local history of the Wuppertal Volume 4, Born-Verlag, Wuppertal 1958, pp. 79–87.
• Horst Heidermann , Klaus Vollmer: Millionaires & Patrons. Ferdinand Thun and Heinrich Janssen from Barmen, Gustav Oberländer from Düren . Ed. Köndgen, Wuppertal 2014, ISBN 978-3-939843-46-7 .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c d} readingeagle.com: The Berkshire . Retrieved January 29, 2016.
2. ^ Federal Archives: Bankhaus Ahr, Krath & Co. Accessed on January 29, 2016.