Rainer Mertens

Rainer Mertens, 2011

Rainer Mertens (born May 5, 1961 in Nuremberg ) is a German historian and head of the collections and exhibitions of Deutsche Bahn .

Life

Professional background

Mertens studied geology, modern history , political science and economics at the Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg in the 1980s . He completed his studies in 1987 with a Magister Artium . From 1990 to 1997 Mertens worked as a research assistant at History For All - Institute for Regional History in Nuremberg and participated in many publications and exhibitions on Nuremberg regional history and carried out his own historical research. In 1996 he received his doctorate under Rudolf Endres with his thesis on Johannes Scharrer . In 1994 he was a co-founder of the Sandberg publishing house in Nuremberg and was also a partner until 2000.

Since April 1997 Mertens has been head of the exhibitions and collections department at the DB Museum in Nuremberg . As a curator and project manager, he organized over a dozen exhibitions on the history of Deutsche Bahn and its predecessors. In 2005 he wrote the script for the short film Unterwegs mit dem Adler , which outlines the development of the German railroad in the museum's permanent exhibition.

Private

Mertens is a keyboardist and is one of the founding members of the rock band Shiny Gnomes , who were under contract with PolyGram from 1988 to 1991 , made international appearances and released numerous records. He is married and has two children.

Appreciations

Mertens the band Shiny Gnomes and 1994 as founder and full-time employees is known for its cultural commitment in 1987 as founder and member history for all with the Culture Prize of the City of Nuremberg been awarded.

Publications (selection)

as an author

• Nuremberg, the discovery of America and the consequences , a colonial city tour, Sandberg Verlag, Nuremberg 1992.
• Johannes Scharrer. Profile of a reformer in Nuremberg between the Enlightenment and Romanticism. Nuremberg workpieces on city and state history, Vol. 57. Korn and Berg, Nuremberg 1996, ISBN 3-87432-134-7 .
• Deutsche Bahn (ed.): The direct train Munich - Nuremberg is the first need , Munich 2002.
• DB Station & Service AG (publisher): 160 years of Munich Central Station. A journey through time , Berlin 2009.

as a co-author

• Rainer Mertens : City Lexicon Nuremberg . Ed .: Michael Diefenbacher , Rudolf Endres . 2nd, improved edition. W. Tümmels Verlag, Nuremberg 2000, ISBN 3-921590-69-8 , p. 335 ( complete edition online ).
• Beyond the White Tower . History and stories from the Jakober quarter, Sandberg-Verlag, Nuremberg 1997.
• Was ist was (youth book series) Volume 54: Die Eisenbahn , Tessloff-Verlag, Nuremberg 2001, ISBN 978-3788602949 .
• DB Museum (Ed.): On separate tracks. Reichsbahn and Bundesbahn 1945–1989 (Volume 3), Nuremberg 2001, ISBN 978-3980765213 .
• DB Museum (Ed.): In the service of democracy and dictatorship. The Reichsbahn 1920–1945 (Volume 2), Nuremberg 2002, ISBN 978-3980765220 .
• DB Museum (ed.): A century under steam. The railways in Germany 1835–1919 . (Volume 1), Nuremberg 2005, ISBN 978-3980765237 .
• DB Museum (Ed.): Go easy Go Bahn. 200 years of railways and advertising , accompanying volume for the exhibition of the same name in the DB Museum, Nuremberg 2008, ISBN 978-3980765299 .

Web links

• Literature by and about Rainer Mertens in the catalog of the German National Library
• Rainer Mertens on the Deutsche Bahn website