Agricultural machinery factory Friedrich Dehne
The agricultural machinery factory Friedrich Dehne , Halberstadt, was one of the oldest and most important agricultural machinery manufacturers in Germany from 1856 to 1985 , and it had its heyday in the decades around the turn of the 20th century. She was a co-founder of the "Association of the German Agricultural Machinery Industry" (LMV), later DLG in 1897. The traditions of this company continue to the present day, the family tradition is still today by the descendant Friedrich-Wilhelm Schröter in the Dehne-Food- Consulting, a technology consultancy for the agricultural production and food industry.
history
The origin of the company was a blacksmith's and fittings forge founded by Heinrich Christian Dehne in Halberstadt in 1829 . The master blacksmith Friedrich Dehne visited the 1st World Exhibition in London in 1851 . In 1853, his son Friedrich Dehne took over the forge and converted it into a repair shop for drilling and threshing machines. In 1861 the company began with the series production of its own bucket seed drills, and from 1872 with the series production of hoeing machines.
In 1862 Georg Woolnought joined the company as Friedrich Dehne's son-in-law and technical director. Before that, Woolnought took care of the technical support for the machines imported from England, including threshing machines for which Dehne was the agency. In 1867 the general agency for steam locomotives of the company John Fowler & Co. (England) was taken over in the whole of Germany, after the first steam plowing in Germany (Wanzleben) had taken place in this region in 1863. After Max Eyth presented a two-machine steam cable plow from Fowler for the first time in 1869, the Dehne company also sold the first steam plow sets in this region, including two steam plow sets to the A. Heucke company in 1870.
In 1876, the production of molding machines based on a patent by Georg Woolnought and Friedrich Dehne began, (individual) which had been developed for the rationalization of their own foundry. From 1878 own steam engines were manufactured to drive threshing machines and for steam cable plows. Friedrich Dehne died in 1886. The management was now in the hands of his son Friedrich Wilhelm, later also Karl, and his sons-in-law Georg Woolnought and Georg Pickert. Georg Pickert represented the company at the founding meeting of the "Association of the German Agricultural Machinery Industry" (LMV) in 1897 (17 founding members) and was president of this association in 1905.
In the period from 1905 to 1908, a second factory was built on Quedlinburger Strasse at the gates of Halberstadt. At that time the company had more than 800 employees. Martin Schröter (von Dehne's son-in-law) joined the company in 1919. From 1931 to 1958 he was personally liable and managing partner of the factory converted in 1936 as Friedrich Dehne KG. Karl Dehne died in 1941.
At the end of the Second World War, Halberstadt was 80% destroyed. The Dehne factories suffered enormous damage. Nevertheless, production began again at the end of 1945, mainly of spare parts and utensils such as small cookers, aluminum saucepans, etc. In connection with the start of a cooperative production of oil coolers, structural extensions were again possible from 1949.
In 1958, Martin Schröter and Anne-Marie Schröter, b. Stretch to flee for political reasons. The company took on a state participation in accordance with the regulations in the GDR. At that time the company had around 300 employees. In the period that followed, the production program was increasingly determined by cooperative production for agricultural machinery, in addition to the already existing cooperative production for engine construction. In connection with this, the company Fr. Dehne KG was assigned to the Association of People's Own Companies, Agricultural Machinery and Tractor Construction, Leipzig in 1964 and to the Weimar Combine in 1970 .
In this context the company was profiled for the development and production of machines and equipment for potato processing. In 1974, the company was converted into a state-owned company called VEB Landmaschinenbau Halberstadt, which grew to around 550 employees by the early 1980s. After the transfer back to the owners in 1992, the potato processing technology program was continued until 1999. After production in the factory was stopped, the family tradition was continued by Friedrich-Wilhelm Schröter in Dehne-Food-Consulting and a successor production company was founded, Inno KAT (Innovation Potato Processing Technology) with the former chief designer Kurt Lippmann and technicians. Potato processing technology is still produced today and sold at home and abroad.
Products
After the start with drilling and chopping machines, the steam locomotives for stationary drives and for two-machine steam cable plows became a focus of the company at the end of the 19th century. Due to its great potential, the company played a major role in the spread of this technology.
At the same time, a wide range of products was created for almost all areas of agriculture, which at the time could be served with means of mechanization. These included plows, cultivators, field rollers, hoeing machines, seed drills, fertilizer spreaders, beet lifters, hay tedders, harvest rakes, threshing machines and forage processing machines with many very innovative and patented solutions. From the mid-1930s, platform trucks with pneumatic tires were added.
After 1945, the focus was initially on cooperation production for engine construction. From the company's own products until the end of the 1950s, tensioning seed drills and platform trucks were manufactured. From 1960 the conversion to tractor tipping trailers with 4 to 5 t took place. In the subsequent cooperation production for agricultural machinery, the add-on seed drill for the implement carrier, the precision seeders as well as the grain and chaff blowers began. From the end of the 1960s, the focus was on separating devices for potato harvesters as well as machines and equipment for potato warehouses (including chain and roller fractionators, picking tables, electronic stone and clod separating devices), with the latter also being developed in-house.
literature
- Eule, W .: The germ and bloom of a German agricultural machinery factory: Fr. Dehne KG Halberstadt; Agricultural machinery factory and iron foundry, founded in 1856 . Spamer, 1937.
- Meyer, F., Herrmann, K., Krombholz, K .: One hundred years for the agricultural engineering industry . Maschinenbau Verlag, Frankfurt / Main 1997, ISBN 3-8163-0342-0 .
- Krombholz, K .: Agricultural machinery in the GDR - light and shadow . DLG-Verlag, Frankfurt / Main 2008, ISBN 978-3-7690-0717-6 .
- Dreyer, K .: Unforgotten agricultural technology - the fascination of once famous manufacturers . DLG-Verlag, Frankfurt / Main 2005, ISBN 3-7690-0648-8 .