Johann Baptist Koch

Johann Baptist Koch (* 1833 ; † 1898 ) was a 19th century German bell founder in Freiburg im Breisgau . His bell foundry operated under the name of Gebrüder Koch .

He was the 20th child of the bell founder Ignaz Koch (1783–1862) from Unterlenzkirch . Together with his brother Bernhard (born May 13, 1824) he learned the bell foundry trade from his brother-in-law Pius Muchenberger . He and Ignaz Koch moved the workshop to Freiburg- Wiehre ("Eisen-, Metall- und Glockengießerei Pius Muchenberger & Co."), where they succeeded the Bayer brothers. In 1846 Ignaz Koch withdrew from the workshop and handed it over to his Sons. Since Pius Muchenberger took part in the revolution in Baden in 1848/49 , he had to bring his family to Switzerland in 1849. He lived and worked for the bell founder Wilhelm Hauck in Freiburg from 1848 to 1850. Bernhard and Johann Baptist Koch continued his foundry as "Koch und Muchenberger", in 1856 they took over the company for good. From 1856 he is first with his brother as co-owner, from May 1, 1862 as sole owner of the bell foundry "Gebrüder Koch".

The bell foundry Gebr. Koch was one of the 83 founding members of the Freiburger Gewerbebank in 1866, the forerunner of today's Volksbank Freiburg .

The company was continued by his only son Otto (1868–1926), who initially traded as a bell founder and later as a master metal founder. His successor was his son Karl Johann (1908–1985), who continued the business as "Eisengießerei Koch", until around 1970 small bells were occasionally cast.

The Koch bell foundry was located in today's Schwarzwaldstraße 41/43 and was bought and demolished by the Ganter brewery in 1932 .

Works (selection)

• 1864: a bell for the Freiburg parish church of St. Martin
• 1866: New casting of the Michael bell of the " Rosenlaecher bell" in Freiburg Minster
• 1882: Bell in the roof turret of the Freiburg Loretto Chapel (strike G sharp ″, 63 kg, diameter 47.7 cm)
• 1889: Vespers bell for the Freiburg Minster
• 1890: three bells for St. Thomas Church in what is now Freiburg's Betzenhausen district
• 1892: Bell in the roof turret of the St. Ottilien Chapel in Freiburg (strike note a ″, about 58 to 60 kg, diameter 46.2 cm)
• 1893: Bell for the Nazi court chapel in St. Peter- Rohr in the Upper Black Forest
• 1899: a bell for the first (wooden) emergency church in Rheinfelden (Baden) , which was built under the direction of the Archbishop's Supervision Inspector Raimund Jeblinger from Freiburg , after its demolition in the successor church of St. Josef , completed in 1915 , it has been hanging in the city cemetery since the beginning of the 21st century .

literature

• Sigrid Thurm: German Bell Atlas . Volume 4: Bathing . Deutscher Kunstverlag, Munich, Berlin 1985, ISBN 3-422-00557-9 , pp. 67-68. 109 note 403.703 (list of bells).
• Franz Kern : The former Koch bell foundry in Freiburg i. Br. In: Freiburger Diözesan-Archiv Volume 112, 1992, pp. 279–338 ( digitized version , with an imprint of the company's order book).

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Volksbank Freiburg, Annual Report 2006, p. 15.
2. ↑ Page on church history on the Internet pages of the parish of St. Martin ( Memento of the original from October 2, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  
3. ↑ The smallest bell of the rose laughing bell, the Michael bell, had obviously cracked only a few years after the casting and "was cast there by the Koch brothers in 1866 because it had cracked" (Cathedral Chapter Josef Marmon , 1878). Sources: All about the Hosianna bell , website of the advisory committee for the German bell system and the bell inspection of the Archdiocese of Freiburg, The bells of the Freiburg Minster: History of the bells, by Andreas Philipp ( Memento of the original from January 18, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: Der 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. 
4. ^ The bells in the city dean of Freiburg , source: Bell database A. Philipp, Göttingen.
5. ↑ The Archbishop's organ construction inspector Carl Schweitzer (a nephew of the Freiburg cathedral music director Johannes Joseph Schweitzer ) mentions a little Vesper bell that was probably cast in the Koch bell foundry in 1889. According to his order book, Johannes Baptist Koch delivered “A bell IN MÜNSTER HIER, 86 pounds, tone B” . It was probably the replacement bell for the " Bintzlinglocke " from 1606, which cracked at the end of the 19th century. Kern 1992, p. 294; Freiburg Minster, bells ; All about the Hosianna bell , website of the advisory committee for the German bell system and the bell inspection of the Archdiocese of Freiburg
6. ↑ Kern 1992, p. 295; Hermann Brommer : Parish Church of the Holy Family and Filial Church of St. Thomas, Freiburg i. Br.-West . Fast and Steiner, Munich 1986, pp 11-22 ( Digitalisat ( Memento of 6 April 2012 at the Internet Archive )).
7. ↑ Kern 1992, p. 298; xxx .
8. ↑ Kern 1992, p. 305; Nazi courtyard chapel in St.Peter-Rohr in new splendor , chapter in the article “Chapels and grottoes in the Black Forest” on the website www.freiburg-schwarzwald.de
9. ↑ Kern 1992, p. 315; Catholic parish of St. Josef Rheinfelden / Baden (ed.): 100 years of Catholic pastoral care St. Josef: Rheinfelden / Baden . Catholic parish, Rheinfelden / Baden 1999.