Ludwig von Gerngros

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Ludwig Ritter von Gerngroß, portrayed in the General-Anzeiger (Nbg.) Of October 22, 1902

Ludwig Gerngroß , from 1902 Knight von Gerngroß , (born May 1, 1839 in Baiersdorf ; died October 3, 1916 in Nuremberg ) was a German merchant and patron.

Life

Birthplace of Ludwig von Gerngros in Baiersdorf, 2011

Ludwig Gerngros was the son of Clara (née Bonté) and Ephraim Hirsch Gerngros (born 1803 in Treuchtlingen ), who had lived in Baiersdorf since 1830 and was a respected member of the then large Jewish community. He had five siblings: Theres Gerngros (born June 23, 1833 in Baiersdorf, died June 10, 1846, ibid), Hirsch Gerngros (September 1834, died three weeks in childbirth), Doreth Gerngros (born November 10, 1835; died : unknown), Philipp Wilhelm Gerngros (later just Wilhelm Ritter von Gerngroß, born on September 28, 1843 in Baiersdorf, died on June 5, 1925 in Nuremberg) and Sophie Gerngros (born on November 25, 1847 in Baiersdorf, died on August 8, 1925). December 1847 ibid).

Gerngros attended the business school in Fürth and began as a traveling salesman for the Mayer Kohn company in Nuremberg. Later he founded his own trading company with Moritz Frauenfeld in Nuremberg, which (under his leadership until 1899) was mainly dedicated to the hop trade and developed very successfully. Gerngros married Julie Tuchmann from Dessau (* December 28, 1845 in Uehlfeld, † April 1, 1923 in Nuremberg), the marriage remained childless.

Ritter von Gerngroß died on October 3, 1916. The funeral speech on the occasion of the great honorary funeral was held by the Lord Mayor of Nuremberg (and later Reich Defense Minister of the Weimar Republic) Otto Geßler .

Act

The Neptune Fountain in its original location on the Hauptmarkt, around 1905

Gerngros (spelled 'Gerngroß' since around 1898/1900) was a patron of his adopted home of Nuremberg that was very committed to promoting urban development and cultural projects. He is the founder of the Luitpoldhaus of the city library (partly destroyed and rebuilt in World War II, demolished in 2009 by the city building authorities) and the second casting of the Neptune fountain . He supported the erection of the memorial for the 50th anniversary of the railway in Germany and the erection of the Kaiser Wilhelm memorial on Egidienberg with significant donations . Ritter von Gerngroß is also one of the founders of the Künstlerhaus Nürnberg , which was inaugurated on July 3, 1910. He made various purchases possible for the Germanisches Nationalmuseum through generous donations. Gerngros established two charitable foundations administered by the city of Nuremberg. In his birthplace Baiersdorf, he donated the building to the Seligmann Children's Foundation in 1906 and in 1907 laid the financial basis for the Red Cross outpatient department there.

For his services he was nominated in 1901 for the award of the Knight's Cross of the Order of Merit of the Bavarian Crown , which he received on October 22, 1902 (on the day the second casting of the Neptune Fountain was set up on the main market); According to the statutes of the order, he was raised to the personal knighthood and was henceforth allowed to call himself a knight of Gerngroß .

From 1908 to 1916 Ritter von Gerngroß was a member of the administrative committee of the Germanisches Nationalmuseum . On May 1, 1909, he had a foundation set up for civil servants and employees of the city of Nuremberg (people who were actively involved in the degradation of Gerngroß in the years after 1933 also benefited from their services during and after the "Third Reich"). After his death, his widow Julie and his brother Wilhelm (Philipp) Ritter von Gerngroß continued the patronage.

From around 1890 until his death in 1916, Ludwig Ritter von Gerngroß belonged to the Morgengesellschaft , a discussion group of liberal-minded patrons from the upper classes that met from 1830 to 1931 in the Lutzgarten inn in Großreuth behind the fortress .

Insult in the National Socialist era

Ritter von Gerngroß was posthumously mocked by the National Socialists in Nuremberg because of his Jewish descent (child's mockery " little knight, like to be big ... "), his foundations were degraded because " the money with which the Jew paid for it was usurped from the German people ", so Julius Streicher NSDAP Gauleiter of Franconia . For Streicher in particular, the well-respected benefactor von Gerngroß, who was highly respected in the memory of the population even years after his death, was apparently a problem because his life story was the evident opposite of the stereotypes of the usury and greedy spread by him in his anti-Semitic smear paper ' Der Stürmer ' Embodied Jews. This explains the vehemence with which Streicher demeaned the deceased von Gerngroß.

The Neptune Fountain (disrespectfully referred to as the "Judenbrunnen" since 1933), from which the plaque with the name Gerngroß had already been removed on June 30, 1933 at the behest of Gauleiter Streicher, was demolished in 1934 and in 1937 in front of the Gauhaus Schlageterplatz set up. Even after the end of the Nazi tyranny in 1945, it was no longer rebuilt on the main market, but moved to the city park in 1962. The foundation stipulation by Ludwig Gerngroß, which expressly made the Hauptmarkt location a condition of the donation, has been disregarded by the city of Nuremberg to this day.

Honors

Grave of Ludwig von Gerngros in the New Jewish Cemetery in Nuremberg, 2011

literature

  • Erich Mulzer: Neptuns Irrfahrten , Altstadtfreunde Nürnberg eV, Nürnberger Altstadtberichte No. 13, 1988, Nürnberg (there p. 21 ff.).

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Magnus Zawodsky: "The" Lutzgarten "in Großreuth is 300 years old" in Nürnberger Zeitung 2006, ( http://www.franken-wiki.de/index.php/Lutzgarten )
  2. ↑ Nuremberg City Archives AVN, C7 / 1 GR no. 5354 / May 19, 1933.
  3. ↑ until 1933 and after 1945 Marienplatz, today Willy-Brandt-Platz
  4. ^ Administrative report of the city of Nuremberg for 1902, page 556.

Web links

Commons : Ludwig von Gerngros  - Collection of images, videos and audio files
personal data
SURNAME Gerngros, Ludwig von
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Gerngroß, Ludwig Ritter von (full name); Gerngros, Ludwig
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German merchant and patron
DATE OF BIRTH May 1, 1839
PLACE OF BIRTH Baiersdorf
DATE OF DEATH October 3, 1916
Place of death Nuremberg