Rosa Helene Schimpf

Rosa Helene Schimpf (born February 4, 1870 in Esslingen am Neckar , † September 1, 1949 ) was a German factory owner's wife who had an entire house moved so that a villa could be built according to her wishes.

Youth and marriage

Rosa Helene Schimpf was born as Rosa Helene Fink. She was the eldest daughter of the composer Christian Fink and his wife Rosa Pauline Karoline, b. Clerk . The family lived in the Hafenmarkt 7 building , which is now the Esslingen City Museum. Like her younger sisters, Rosa Helene Fink received singing lessons from her mother in addition to school lessons; she also had piano lessons. After graduating from the secondary school for girls in the old town hall , she continued her musical and artistic training and attended the women's labor school for three years. Her goal was to later train domestic helpers herself.

In 1895 she married the glove manufacturer Ernst Schimpf († 1942), who together with his brother August ran the Bodmer ice cream glove factory on the Schlachthausbrücke. The children Hans Friedrich Wilhelm (1897–1935) and Elisabeth Eugenie Rosa (* 1898) were born in the young couple's first residence on Schelztorstrasse ; later the family moved into Rosa Helene Schimpf's parents' house and in 1907 into the long-planned Villa Schimpf.

Rosa Helene Schimpf's son Hans was the father and Rosa Helene Schimpf was the paternal grandmother of the actor Rolf Schimpf .

Villa Schimpf

This “old German” house with 24 rooms was designed by Albert Benz according to the wishes of the Schimpf couple; However, Ernst and Rosa Helene Schimpf were actively involved in the design. While Rosa Helene Schimpf designed a two-story glass window that showed the coats of arms of all of Esslingen's mayors, painted and burned the stove and fountain tiles himself and embroidered huge wall hangings, Ernst Schimpf decorated the ceiling beams, doors and his desk with carvings. In the basement of the villa there was a house chapel with an old Madonna figure. The most remarkable thing about Villa Schimpf, however, was its building history. Since an old half-timbered house of the Bodmer family from 1578 stood on the planned building plot at Mettinger Straße 17 , which they did not want to simply demolish, the Stuttgart architect and engineer Erasmus Rückgauer was commissioned to relocate the building. He separated the half-timbered house from its foundation, put it on rails and moved it 17 meters to the neighboring property. The Schimpf villa no longer exists. It was sold in 1952 and demolished in 1956 by the property buyer.

activities

The Villa Schimpf offered Rosa Helene Schimpf enough space to put her youth plans into practice. She took in young girls who received thorough domestic training from her. Meanwhile, her husband was not only active professionally but also in the service of the art and antiquity society. The children were often looked after by the numerous staff.

In 1914, Rosa Helene Schimpf volunteered for "duty on the home front". She worked during the First World War and afterwards, among other things, in the field post aid. In 1919 she ran for the DDP in the municipal council election . In the call for elections, her services in the municipal war aid, the war kitchens , the field post aid, the war widow counseling and the national women's service were listed. Apart from Anna Grün, only men were elected by the Württemberg Citizens' Party .

In 1924 Rosa Helene Schimpf and Klara Enßlin succeeded Lena Mayer-Benz as chairwoman of the Esslingen Housewives' Association. In 1930 Prof. Immendörfer took over this office. After the housewife Association into line was, he broke up the 1935th Rosa Helene Schimpf gave the address on this.

In the same year her son Hans, a former corvette captain , was forced to shoot himself "on higher orders". In 1942 Rosa Helene Schimpf lost her husband. After the daughter-in-law was bombed out in Berlin , she moved back to her parents' house with her four children, including her son Rolf Schimpf , who was born in 1924 . Rosa Maria Schimpf's daughter, her husband Egon Merz and child, born in 1931, and her younger sister Eugenie Fink also lived here. Rosa Helene Schimpf now worked without servants in the house, garden and vineyard. She also cataloged her father's musical works until 1946.

Rosa Helene Schimpf was buried in the Ebershaldenfriedhof .

literature

• Margarete Siegele, Rosa Helene Schimpf b. Fink (1870-1949). An upper class life . In: Women's Commissioner of the City of Esslingen am Neckar (ed.): Women. Fates. Careers. Vocations. 1850-1950 . Esslingen 2005, ISBN 3-9809328-8-5 , pp. 22-33