Johann Leopold Köffiller

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Johann Leopold Köffiller , also Köffiler , from 1767 Edler von Köffiller , from 1773 Knight von Köffiller (* 1743 in Brno ; † September 17, 1814 there ) was an Austrian banker, textile entrepreneur and civil servant. He is considered to be the founder of the Brno textile industry.

Life

Köffiller came from a respected bourgeois family in Brno. His father was Johann Michael Köffiller († 1756) from the Carinthian "St. Pattermann" , whose exchange and banking house was in the house "Zur Goldenen Kugel" (later Palais Klein) on the Great Market in Brno. The guardian Paul Kofler oversees Köffiller's training in the family's trading business. From 1761 to 1763, Köffiller worked as a volunteer in a Prague exchange office and then went on a grand tour of Europe. After that he worked as a negociant. In 1767 Köffiller acquired Brno citizenship, at the same time he was given power of disposal over the property left by his father. In the same year he was raised to the Austrian nobility.

In 1768, Köffiller leased a disreputable Aryan cloth factory on Grosse Neugasse outside the gates of his hometown with 30 looms and a plush factory. Behind the cloth factory, Köffiller began building the Schmalka workers' settlement. Despite multiple advance payments from Emperor Joseph II , business was bad and as early as 1770 Köffiller had the plush factory shut down. In order to improve the quality of his products, Köffiller appointed Johann Bartholomäus Seitter from Augsburg as director. Since then, cloth specialists have been recruiting in the German textile centers. These included u. a. Johann Heinrich Offermann and Wilhelm Mundy from Montjoie as well as Johann Grave, Heinrich Hopf from Balingen , Johann Gottfried Bräunlich from Weida , Johann Christian Gloxin from Uckermark and Paul Turetschek, some of whom founded their own companies for a short time. On October 22, 1773, Köffiller and his brother Carl, postmaster in Pohrlitz , were raised to knighthood.

On September 13, 1781, Emperor Joseph II visited the Köffiller factory. Since most of his workers were Protestant, Köffiller and Seitter campaigned for approval to found a Protestant parish. It is assumed that this conversation could have been decisive for the promulgation of the tolerance patent exactly one month later . After the establishment of the Protestant community in 1782, the Catholic and Freemason supported it financially several times for the construction of a house of prayer.

Due to the exploitation of the weavers, there was a first strike in 1785. In 1786, 120 looms were already being operated in the Köffiller's factory and, mainly in the publishing system, more than a thousand employees were employed for Köffiller. The cloths had gotten over their bad reputation and were u. a. exported to Italy, Russia and the Orient. After Köffiller had renounced his responsibilities in 1787 and only appeared as the owner of the capital, the company began to decline. As a result of the Turkish crisis and loans of over 400,000 guilders, Köffiller had to declare bankruptcy in 1789.

In 1788, Köffiller leased the Moravian consumption tax that he had previously created and, after its nationalization, acted as its administrator between 1794 and 1814.

The factory buildings including the Schmalka settlement were demolished in the 1920s and the Hotel Passage was built in their place. Today the Hotel Slovan is located there.

Between 1867 and 1919 and 1939 and 1946, the Stará ( Old Street ) in Zábrdovice was named Köffillergasse (Köffilerova) in his honor.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ http://actapublica.eu/matriky/brno/prohlizec/7939/?strana=258
  2. ↑ Archive link ( Memento of the original from March 4, 2016 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.  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.bhb.bruenn.org

literature

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personal data
SURNAME Köffiller, Johann Leopold
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Austrian entrepreneur
DATE OF BIRTH 1743
PLACE OF BIRTH Brno
DATE OF DEATH September 17, 1814
Place of death Brno