Kurt Erdmann Rosenthal
Kurt Erdmann Rosenthal (born September 1, 1871 in Berlin ; † July 2, 1946 in Pfullingen in Württemberg ) was a German industrialist and pioneer of the carbide and acetylene industry in Germany.
Life
Kurt Erdmann Rosenthal was born in Berlin and received his education at the grammar school in Naumburg (Saale) . After graduating from high school, he studied engineering with a focus on mechanical engineering and metallurgy , first from the winter semester 1890/91 at the Technical University of Berlin-Charlottenburg , before moving to the Technical University of Braunschweig for two semesters in the summer semester of 1892 . In the summer semester of 1893 he moved to the Technical University of Karlsruhe and returned to Braunschweig after completing his studies.
After completing his studies, Rosenthal initially worked for several years in various large industrial companies. In 1897 he built the first carbide plant in Europe based on the American model in Trollhättan , Sweden. In 1898 he organized the international acetylene exhibition in Berlin. Then he founded a technical office for the construction of acetylene plants under his name and started trading calcium carbide, the raw material for acetylene production.
In 1902 he founded the Brandenburgische Carbidwerke GmbH with Alfred M. Goldschmidt with a carbide plant in Steinbusch near Woldenberg , which used the hydroelectric power of the Drage . In 1903 another carbide production was started in Mühlthal near Bromberg using the water power of the Brahe . In 1906 Rosenthal and Goldschmidt founded Norsk Elektrokemisk Aktieselskab in Norway to acquire, expand and utilize the hydropower of the three waterfalls Dalsfoss, Tvanteid Foss and Foss Solum as a subsidiary of the Brandenburg Carbide Works and built a calcium carbide factory in the ice-free port of Kragerö . In 1907 the Ostdeutsche Wasserkraft GmbH was founded to use two waterfalls of the Küddow in Borkendorf and Koschütz near Schneidemühl . In 1909 Rosenthal and Goldschmidt merged Ostdeutsche Wasserkraft GmbH with Brandenburgische Carbidwerke GmbH to form Brandenburgische Carbid- und Elektricitätswerke Aktiengesellschaft. During the First World War , they built another carbide plant in Waldeck using the hydropower of the Edertalsperre .
During the First World War, Rosenthal participated as an expert at Stage Inspection II, at the Bulgarian Army Administration and the occupation army in Romania.
In 1929 Kurt Erdmann Rosenthal became general director of Brandenburgische Electricitäts-, Gas- und Wasserwerke AG. The Brandenburgische Carbid- und Electricitätswerke AG had renamed themselves to this as part of the merger with Continentalen Wasser- und Gaswerke AG, Berlin, after on the one hand other products such as ferrosilicon and calcium cyanamide were produced and on the other hand electricity was supplied to municipal networks, while the carbide production as Consequences of the war had been abandoned. In 1930, the company Körting's Electricitätswerke, Berlin, was incorporated through the merger.
On April 1, 1938, he resigned from the management of the company due to age. It is unclear whether other reasons played a role in his resignation. Kurt Erdmann Rosenthal was of Jewish descent on his father's side. As a so-called Jewish mongrel , who also lived in mixed marriage , he was not subject to all discriminatory measures and he was not deported either . Bombed out in his last apartment in Berlin, he was evacuated to Pfullingen in 1943 as an air war victim. where he died in 1946.
Kurt Erdmann Rosenthal was a co-founder and board member of the German Acetylene Association. He was vice-president of Vergasungs-Industrie AG, Vienna and chairman of the supervisory board of waterworks and sewer structures O. Smreker GmbH, Berlin. He was also a member of the supervisory boards of Continentalen Wasserwerk GmbH, the corporation for cardboard manufacturing and Büttner-Werke AG, Uerdingen.
In 1912 Rosenthal acquired the Streganz manor in what is now the Oder-Spree district as a hunting seat .
Awards
- In 1909 Kurt Erdmann Rosenthal was awarded the St. Olav Order, 2nd class, by the Norwegian King .
- In 1911 he became an honorary member of the National Thanks for Veterans.
- In 1911 he was awarded the Red Eagle Order IV class in recognition of his services to the industrialization of East Germany .
Family foundation Hofgärtner Hermann Sello
Kurt Erdmann Rosenthal was the son of Hermann Rosenthal (1833–1908), a Berlin manufacturer, the founder of the H. Rosenthal tube company, later Valentin Röhren- und Eisen-GmbH, and Pauline Rosenthal nee Nietner (1830–1899). Since both the mother of Pauline Rosenthal née Nietner was née Sello, Charlotte Luise Albertine Sello, and her father was the grandson of a née Sello, Kurt Erdmann Rosenthal belonged to the Sello family, a dynasty of court gardeners who had lived in Potsdam and Berlin since 1718 was in the service of the Prussian royal family. Hermann Sello , who died childless in Potsdam in 1876, had set up a family foundation. After the foundation's assets had almost been used up by inflation and the economic crisis between the two world wars, it was Kurt Erdmann Rosenthal who owed the foundation's continued existence beyond the Second World War by bequeathing his considerable fortune to it. Why he disinherited his two sons - John and Peter-Paul - in this context could not be clarified. Linked to his legacy was an amendment to the foundation statutes. The purpose of the foundation was now to maintain family cohesion.
Corps student
In the winter semester 1890/91 Kurt Erdmann Rosenthal joined the Corps Saxonia-Berlin. When he moved to Braunschweig to study for the summer semester of 1892, he reconstituted the old Zurich Corps Rhenania , founded in 1855 and which had existed in Aachen from 1871 to 1880, on May 7, 1892 with a member of the Corps Franconia Karlsruhe and a member of the Corps Stauffia Stuttgart . As an old man he was later made an honorary boy by Rhenania. In the summer semester of 1893, when he moved to Karlsruhe to study, he joined the Corps Franconia Karlsruhe. In 1896 he was co-editor of the first almanac of the Weinheim Senior Citizens' Convention (WSC), which contained the addresses of all approximately 3000 members of the WSC living at the time. On his decisive initiative, the five-member union was founded in 1897. He became the first three-band man of the five-band.
literature
- Carl Weigandt: History of the Corps Saxonia-Berlin to Aachen 1867-1967 , Aachen 1968.
- Kurt Erdmann Rosenthal's curriculum vitae in Brandenburgische Carbid- und Electricitäts-Werke Aktiengesellschaft , Verlag Adolf Eckstein, Berlin-Charlottenburg, approx. 1915.
- Rosenthal, Kurt, E. In: Robert Volz: Reich manual of the German society . The handbook of personalities in words and pictures. Volume 2: L-Z. Deutscher Wirtschaftsverlag, Berlin 1931, DNB 453960294 , pp. 1564–1565.
- Rosenthal, Kurt E. In: Georg Wenzel: German business leader . Life courses of German business personalities. A reference book on 13,000 business figures of our time. Hanseatische Verlagsanstalt, Hamburg / Berlin / Leipzig 1929, DNB 948663294 , Sp. 1866–1867.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Kragerø Energi - historien.
- ^ Sachsenblatt (Mitteilungen des Corps Saxonia-Berlin), Volume 22, Number 1, May 1, 1938, p. 7.
- ↑ Award certificate of the "Kongelike Norske Sanct Olavs Orden" from September 7, 1911.
- ↑ Certificate of Honorary Membership of National Thanks for Veterans of March 11, 1911.
- ↑ Award certificate of the Red Eagle Order No. 8956 of September 7, 1911
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Rosenthal, Kurt Erdmann |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | German industrialist |
| DATE OF BIRTH | September 1, 1871 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Berlin |
| DATE OF DEATH | July 2, 1946 |
| Place of death | Pfullingen |