Marianne Rhodius

Marianne Rhodius at a young age

Marianne Rhodius (born as de Greiff ; * October 12, 1814 in Linn (then Generalgouvernement Berg ); † November 2, 1902 in Krefeld ), daughter of Johann Phillip de Greiff and Marianne de Greiff, born. ter Meer, was a wealthy Krefeld citizen who made a name for herself through significant donations to promote welfare and culture. She left almost all of her capital assets to the city of Krefeld for charitable and non-profit purposes.

Life

Marianne grew up with her two years younger sister Emma in the hunting lodge of Linn Castle . In 1835 she married Christoph Eduard Rhodius, 11 years her senior, a merchant and wine merchant from Cologne . The families had been close friends for several years. But as early as 1850, for unknown reasons, she moved back to her father in Linn , where she lived in the Jagdschlösschen for most of the year. Marianne and Christoph Rhodius lived in separate property, the marriage was never divorced. Christoph Rhodius only continued his father's wine trade for a short time and retired early in Salburghoven near Salzburg . Occasionally he visited his wife in Linn, but due to his state of health he never stayed there very long. Even if he shouldn't really have to rely on it, he was occasionally supported financially by his wife. Christoph Rhodius died in 1873.

When her father Philipp de Greiff died in 1862, her mother had been dead for 23 years. Her sister Emma, ​​married to Eduard Mumm, had also died. Thus Marianne became the universal heir of all her father's fortune, with the exception of a few smaller legates.

Just a year later, her uncle, the former silk manufacturer Cornelius de Greiff, also died . Since Cornelius de Greiff had no descendants of his own, he also appointed his niece Marianne as a universal heiress. His legacy contained many great bequests and generous donations that made the city's history. The rest of his fortune, including all real estate, went to Marianne Rhodius.

In addition to her father's trading companies, her many possessions now also included Haus Greiffenhorst in Greiffenhorstpark , the Mühlenhof with its mill, the Drenekerhof and Hausenhof in Linn, the estates in the Elt and, above all, the Linn Castle and the hunting lodge. The latter was known as Greiffenburg at the time . Both inheritances increased her property in Linn to an incredible 2,553,205 m² (1,020 acres ). Old Linner citizens said at the time that Linn belonged to Mrs. Rhodius.

Due to a modest way of life for her class, Marianne Rhodius was able to increase her inherited wealth. However, with the former managing director of her uncle, Heinrich Friedrich Montandon, she had an excellent and absolutely loyal advisor at her side. Nevertheless, even without his help, she knew a lot about dealing with so much money.

Her uncle Cornelius de Greiff already caused a sensation as a benefactor of Krefeld beyond the city limits. And his mother was known as benefactor and founded by private funds, the Crefelder hospitals , today Krefeld Hospital , recently owned by Helios catches. According to his will, a committee was set up to enforce his testamentary interests with persons named by him. Marianne Rhodius tried to heed these interests to the end, with which the city of Krefeld and the committee sometimes found it very difficult. Already during her lifetime she donated 4,500,000 gold marks from her fortune (corresponds to between 41 million and 80 million euros today ) for charity. Marianne Rhodius, herself a Mennonite , campaigned against great resistance for the construction of the synagogue in Linn, for which her father had left a legacy of 8,000 thalers shortly before his death . She contributed 100,000 marks to finance the construction of the Kaiser Wilhelm Museum and supported the poet Elise Polko financially in the form of interest-free loans and donations.

According to her uncle's will, a catering house was to be set up for needy unemployed men over 65 years of age. For this purpose, Cornelius de Greiff donated 50,000 thalers. He donated the same amount again to provide food for needy women of the same age. However, this caused some difficulties between the city of Krefeld and the committee, which only had to decide on the use of the money to be earmarked for this. One way out seemed to be to ask Ms. Rhodius to let her uncle's former factory building, the office of her uncle's "Cornelius and Johannes Floh" firm, and to set up such an institution here. Marianne Rhodius complied with the request and from then on the Corneliusstift on Koenigsstrasse in Krefeld was known as a home for poor and needy old people.

Marianne Rhodius 1900

For the time it was a total of a sum that had not yet been donated from private assets to charitable purposes in Germany.

Marianne Rhodius usually only lived in Greiffenburg in summer. As the first citizen of Krefeld, she had a private bathroom installed there, of which almost nothing is left today in a non-public part of the castle. However, Marianne Rhodius spent the winters and the last years of her life in her town house at Friedrichstrasse 18 in Krefeld, where she died in 1902 at the age of 88.

Her grave is still to this day in the old part of the Krefeld main cemetery (field C, no. 65–88) and is preserved by the city of Krefeld as an honorary grave.

estate

Like her uncle before, Marianne Rhodius remained childless. And like her uncle, she turned out to be a generous donor. And like her uncle's will, hers attracted a great deal of attention. 1,800,000 marks (approx. 16.4 million euros) flowed into the "Cornelius de Greiff'scher support fund" for the needy and poor. She deliberately chose this title and not her own name in order to preserve the memory of her uncle Cornelius de Greiff, to whom she owed most of her own prosperity. And just as deliberately she renounced a purpose limitation, probably in bad memory of the difficult execution of her uncle's will before. The town of Linn was given 100,000 marks for the construction of a hospital. All loans under 3,000 marks were canceled by the debtors, which effectively reached a great number of people not only in Linn directly. She bequeathed the Linner property to her cousin Maria Schelleckes, a born Wortmann, who made her her universal heiress.

Maria Schelleckes lived with her husband Conrad Schelleckes on the Greiffenburg in Linn. The now widowed Conrad Schelleckes sold Greiffenburg, Haus Greiffenhorst and the four farms in Linn and their associated properties in 1928 for 506,000 marks to the city of Krefeld, which in return granted him a lifelong right to live in Linn Castle.

Due to the turmoil during two world wars, two inflations and the greed of the National Socialists, nothing is left of the money from the "Cornelius de Greiff'scher Support Fund" foundation. According to its name, a Cornelius-de-Greiff-Stift still exists today as a senior citizens' home in Krefeld, which, however, can no longer fall back on the legacy of its namesake.

In honor of Marianne Rhodius , the Marianne Rhodius Room was named in the Jagdschlösschen, now part of the Burg Linn Museum Center , in which, in addition to the pictures shown here with her portrait, there is also furniture from her property. The painting was done by the portrait painter Caroline Bardua , who was in great demand at her time, and shows Marianne Rhodius at a young age. Bardua was a student of Gerhard von Kügelgen .

After Marianne Rhodius, the former "Marianne-Rhodius-Realschule für Mädchen" (secondary school for girls) in Krefeld was named after Marianne Rhodius in 1956. Today it is a comprehensive school and officially no longer bears her name.

A street in Krefeld was also named after her.

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• Walter Nettelbeck: Cornelius de Greiff - A silk manufacturer who greatly surprised his fellow citizens after death . Scherpe Verlag, Krefeld 1969. ISBN 379-480-023-0
• Johanna Klümpen Hegmans: Linn Castle and Town - from the Middle Ages to the present . ISBN 3-7948-0210-1