Paul Michelet
Paul (Edouard Henri) Michelet (born October 26, 1835 in Berlin , † November 29, 1926 there ) was a Berlin fur merchant and local politician during the German Empire; 51. Honorary Citizen of the City of Berlin.
Life
Paul Michelet came from the old Berlin Huguenot family Michelet, who originally immigrated from Metz and also came from the Berlin philosophy professor Karl Ludwig Michelet , a second cousin of Paul Michelet. Later, through a grandson of Paul Michelet, there were family connections to the family of the Rixdorf city councilor Gustav Leyke .
Paul Michelet was born as the son of the fur manufacturer Louis Paul Michelet (1805-1870) at Jerusalemer Strasse 35 in the heart of Berlin. After attending commercial school and years of training in his father's company, but also in London and Paris, he successfully ran his father's fur business in Leipziger Strasse in the center of Berlin and became a purveyor to the Prussian court. In 1861 he became a co-owner of the family company, successfully continued it after the death of his father in 1870 and only passed the management on to his nephews in 1899, who, however, were unable to maintain the company permanently. He lived with his family in Tiergarten-Süd, directly on the Landwehr Canal , on Schöneberger Ufer 21.
Following the example of his father, who held the function of district mayor for 24 years, Paul Michelet turned to Berlin's local politics as a part-time job: in 1873 he became district director, and in 1887 for the first time a city councilor. From 1899 he devoted himself exclusively to his voluntary work. He was a member of the accounting and budget committee and the general directorate of the orphan administration of the French colony and was later responsible for the administration of the Berlin market halls and for the foundation deputation. The reputation he had gained helped him to be elected as deputy head of the city council in 1894. In 1908 Paul Michelet - as successor to Dr. Paul Langerhans senior (1820–1909; made 45th honorary citizen of Berlin in 1900) - head of the city council. In this function, Michelet is said to have distinguished himself through calm and security in the execution of his office, through his sense of justice and his impartiality. His term of office fell during the years of office of the Berlin mayor Martin Kirschner (1842–1912, mayor from 1899 to 1912, also an honorary citizen of the city) and Adolf Wermuth (1855–1927, mayor from 1912 to 1921); Michelet was actively involved in the inauguration of the latter, a former State Secretary in the Reich government. After the revolution of 1918, Michelet withdrew from local politics.
City councilor and honorary citizen
He gained outstanding importance through his many years of work as a city councilor and head of the city council of Berlin , for which on the occasion of the 25th anniversary of service on January 20, 1914 - together with his friend and temporary deputy, the city councilor Oskar Cassel (1849-1923) - the Honorary citizenship of the city of Berlin was awarded.
In an appraisal in the Berlin monthly journal of the Luisenstädtischer Bildungsverein (2000) it is emphasized that the phase of honorary citizenship awards between 1900 and 1920 in general and the appreciation of Paul Michelet in particular reflected the self-confidence of the city's self-government and its politically active personalities. The honors were no longer generals, diplomats and decorative representatives of the imperial city, but committed city citizens - as an expression of a self-confident commune in the Wilhelmine Empire. Historically, it should be emphasized that Paul Michelet was the first representative of the economy to be honored with Berlin honorary citizenship (and has remained one of the few business representatives with this honor to this day) - and that he also belongs to the small minority among the honorary citizens who in Berlin were born.
memory
Michelet died very old and is buried in Cemetery II of the French Reformed Congregation on Liesenstrasse in the Oranienburger Vorstadt (today: Berlin-Gesundbrunnen ; Liesenstrasse 7). The family's grave is still preserved today. His grave is dedicated to the city of Berlin as an honorary grave .
So far, no street or square in Berlin has been named after this 51st honorary citizen of the city.
In Jüdenstrasse , directly in the eastern side entrance portal of the Red City Hall in Berlin-Mitte , where the city council met in those years, a plaque from 1908 still commemorates him and his predecessors (in the passage area from the side entrance, Jüdenstrasse 1, to the inner courtyard, on the left - across from the similar memorial plaque for the Berlin mayor). The inscription is now difficult to decipher due to the aging - the last entry in the corner with the most faded inscription refers, barely legible, to Paul Michelet.
Honorary grave of the Michelet family in November 2010
Honorary grave of the Michelet family in April 2018
literature
- Eberhard Fromm: Committed Berliners as honorary citizens . In: Berlin monthly magazine ( Luisenstädtischer Bildungsverein ) . Issue 4, 2000, ISSN 0944-5560 , p. 70-72 ( luise-berlin.de ).
Web links
- List of Berlin honorary citizens at the Berlin House of Representatives
- Paul Michelet . In: List of honors of the Luisenstädtischer Bildungsverein
Individual evidence
- ^ Philipp Manes : The German fur industry and its associations 1900-1940, attempt at a story . Berlin 1941 Volume 1. Copy of the original manuscript, p. 150 ( G. & C. Franke collection ).
- ↑ Eberhard Fromm: Committed Berliners as honorary citizens . In: Berlin monthly magazine ( Luisenstädtischer Bildungsverein ) . Issue 4, 2000, ISSN 0944-5560 , p. 70-72 ( luise-berlin.de ).
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Michelet, Paul |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Michelet, Paul Edouard Henri |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | City councilor and businessman, honorary citizen of Berlin |
| DATE OF BIRTH | October 26, 1835 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Berlin |
| DATE OF DEATH | November 29, 1926 |
| Place of death | Berlin |