Leonard Monheim

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Leonard Monheim , painting by Caspar von Reth
Villa Monheim

Leonard Monheim (born June 16, 1830 in Aachen ; † January 23, 1913 there ) was one of the defining personalities of the German chocolate industry in the 19th and early 20th centuries. He founded Leonard Monheim AG , whose chocolate a . a. was sold under the brand name Trumpf .

Life

Family and education

Leonard Maria Monheim was the ninth and youngest child of the Aachen pharmacist Johann Peter Joseph Monheim (1786–1855) and his wife Lucia Dorothe nee. Emonts (1790–1848) born. His grandfather Andreas Monheim (1750–1804) immigrated from Cologne in 1775 and in 1788 became the sole owner of the Adler pharmacy on the chicken market .

Leonard was sent to a chaplain in Neuwerk (today the city of Mönchengladbach ) when he was around ten to twelve years old, because his father was heavily involved in his commercial and scientific activities and his mother was in poor health as a result of a stroke . a. taught in French and Latin . After completing his school education, he began a three-year apprenticeship in his father's drug and material goods business in 1846 at the age of sixteen (some of which were manufactured in the laboratory that his grandfather had set up ). After completing his training, he worked for four years in large trading houses in Germany and France. From 1849 he was a trainee in Mainz at the grocery store Cajetan Josef Giani (whose son later became his brother-in-law and partner), from 1850 in Lyon at Bietrise ainé drugstore, Pharmacie et Épicerie . In Marseille he completed his training in the colonial goods store Albert Frères . He acquired extensive language skills and visited the Italian cities of Rome , Florence and Venice .

In 1853 he returned to Aachen and married Antoinette Merckelbach on September 8, 1856 (* May 17, 1835 in Wittem ; † February 5, 1913 in Aachen). He had five children with her, including the sons Hermann Josef (1868–1945) and Mathieu Monheim (1878–1940).

Leonard Monheim lived with his family in "Haus Marienhöhe", which he had built around 1874 by the architect Hermann Joseph Hürth and which is now a listed building as "Villa Monheim".

Merchant and chocolate producer in Aachen

1853 joined Leonard Monheim as partners in the drug business details of his father, while his older brother Victor Monheim the pharmacy next led the father and the chemical laboratory.

With his principal Cajetan Josef Giani in Mainz, who came from Italy, or on his return trip to Aachen via Italy and Switzerland, Leonard Monheim got to know chocolate production and then developed the idea of increasing the sales of his father's pharmacy by producing chocolate . In 1857 he took over the business and introduced the distribution of colonial goods and tropical fruits as well as the production of chocolate by his own chocolatier . The year 1857 is therefore considered to be the year Trumpf chocolate was founded . Back then, chocolate was not only an expensive luxury item, it was also used as a medicine. When the demand for his "health chocolate" increased, Leonard began to machine chocolate in 1868. On July 1, 1866, he took on his brother-in-law Caspar Giani as a partner. By 1877, further facilities for the "mechanical production of chocolate including spice mills, sugar cutting and production of powder refinade" were added. In 1878 he separated from Caspar Giani. In 1890 he took on his eldest son Hermann Josef as a partner in the company. In 1895 chocolate production was relocated from Jakobstraße 10 to Antoniusstraße 24/26. In 1900 Leonard withdrew from the business and handed over the management of chocolate production to his son Hermann Josef. His other son Mathieu took over the grocery trade.

Leonard Monheim died in Aachen on January 23, 1913. He found his final resting place in Westfriedhof II in Aachen. His entrepreneurial life's work was carried on by his descendants. The husband of his great-granddaughter Irene (born 1927), the entrepreneur and patron of the arts, Peter Ludwig , built Leonard Monheim AG into the leading German and at times world's largest chocolate and cocoa manufacturer and later renamed the company Ludwig Schokolade .

Church engagement

In Lyon and Marseilles, Monheim had got to know the Marian Congregation . At the request of Jesuit father Eck, Monheim played a key role in founding the Aachen congregation “Maria Immaculata” on October 9, 1855. In 1862 and 1879 Monheim was a member of the committee for the Catholic Day , which met in Aachen during these two years. In addition, since 1848 he was a member of the Aachen Vinzenzgemeinschaft “Conference St. Paul”, from 1889 to 1910 its chairman and from 1910 honorary chairman.

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Leonard Monheim. Retrieved March 13, 2019 .
  2. ^ Couven Museum Aachen. Retrieved on March 14, 2019 (German).
  3. ^ Mathieu Monheim. History of the Monheim family, accessed on March 13, 2019 .
  4. ^ Immo Zapp: New German Biography, Volume 18 . 1997 ( online [accessed March 13, 2019]).
  5. ↑ Brand Lexicon | Trump card. Retrieved March 15, 2019 .
  6. ^ Address book for Aachen and Burtscheid 1877
personal data
SURNAME Monheim, Leonard
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German manufacturer
DATE OF BIRTH June 16, 1830
PLACE OF BIRTH Aachen
DATE OF DEATH January 23, 1913
Place of death Aachen