Rudolf Weber (entrepreneur)

Rudolf Weber (born June 12, 1856 in Schneppenkauten near Weidenau an der Sieg ; † October 15, 1932 in Bonn ) was a German iron and steel engineer and entrepreneur . He was the founder of the Weber rolling mill in Brandenburg an der Havel , which later became the Brandenburg steel and rolling mill.

life and work

After graduating from school, Rudolf Weber studied metallurgy from 1874 to 1878 at the Technical University of Karlsruhe , the Technical University of Aachen and the Technical University (Berlin-) Charlottenburg . This was followed by military service as a one-year volunteer in the artillery . From 1883 he joined Philip Weber GmbH, his father's rolling mill in Langenau. Rudolf Weber's grandfather was involved in two thin sheet rolling mills in Siegerland and his father, Philipp Weber, operated a thin sheet rolling mill near Altenhunden in the Sauerland, which he gave up in 1880 in order to found a new thin sheet rolling mill in Dortmund, which he continued to own Death in 1897. In 1908, the Dortmund rolling mill, under the direction of brother Karl Weber, suddenly suffered considerable losses, which caused it to be shut down in 1909.

Rudolf Weber and his father founded a sheet rolling mill , puddling and rolling mill in Dortmund in 1878 , which achieved success in a few years, was expanded and was in operation until 1909. In 1893 he founded a rolling mill himself in Hostenbach an der Saar , which came into operation in 1895.

In contrast to Dortmund, it was planned as a heavy plate rolling mill. Thanks to the good economic situation and economic support, new plans to expand and improve the company could be drawn up as early as 1897. In 1902 a Siemens-Martin steelworks with initially two, later three Siemens-Martin furnaces with a capacity of 20 t each was put into operation. This made you independent of suppliers. The profits were made more from skillfully exploiting the commercial possibilities than from cheap production, with Rudolf Weber assuming a double function as the main technician and commercial manager. In this function he also supported the Dortmund steelworks.

The unexpected closure of the steelworks in Dortmund consumed the funds that had been set aside for the renewal of the Hosterbach plant. In 1912 he sold the Hostenbach plant to the newly founded steel company Arbed .

Now he implemented his idea of ​​building a steel mill in the greater Berlin area. The amount of scrap metal in the big city offered an inexpensive source of raw materials and the industry in Berlin was an important buyer of rolling mill products. In 1912 Weber acquired an inexpensive plot of 800,000 m² in Brandenburg, which formed a triangle between the silo canal built in 1911 on the Berlin-Hamburg waterway and the Berlin-Magdeburg-Mittelland canal, the Brandenburg city railway and Magdeburger Landstrasse. The location was excellently connected to the central German waterway network and the railway network.

The Brandenburg rolling mill was put into operation in the spring of 1914. It was planned and set up as a steel and rolling mill from the outset. The factory expansion cost 3,000,000 marks and a long-term loan of 800,000 marks was taken out. This exceeded the planned sum of 24,000,000 marks. Although that was completely against Rudolf Weber's habit of making himself dependent on banks, he aimed at building what was then a state-of-the-art facility. Initially, two Siemens-Martin furnaces with a capacity of 40 t each were put into operation, which were fired by three and later two additional generators. The steel works hall was built by a Berlin company and measured 40 meters wide and 60 meters long; later it was extended perpendicular to the Siloh Canal. In the eastern part of the steelworks building was the casting hall and the two rolling mills were located a short distance apart, so that the flow of material from west to east ran parallel to the Siloh Canal. In addition to the steelworks, the Richter iron foundry was bought up as a foundry for the molds, i.e. H. Casting molds of the steel mill. A two-storey administration building was also built, which until 1919 contained the entire commercial and technical management.

In addition to the expected initial difficulties, the outbreak of the First World War came shortly after the company opened. As production increased, a further expansion was undertaken, which cost around 1,000,000 marks. Then there were considerable difficulties. In the autumn of 1917 the supply of coal to the plant was halted because the supply was prevented. This brought the operation to a standstill. The Reich Coal Commissioner refused further deliveries. It has been suspected that the competitors wanted to force the weighty competitor out of the market. Under these circumstances, Rudolf Weber sold his work to the German-Luxemburgish Mining and Hütten-AG in 1917 .

The founder of the steel industry in Brandenburg retired into private life and lived in Bonn on the Rhine until his death in 1932 .

family

Rudolf Weber was married in his first marriage to Franziska Düber from whom three children emerged named Otto Weber, Richard Weber, Lita Weber.

literature

• Klaus Weber: About the founding family Weber. In: 90 years of steel from Brandenburg. Contemporary witnesses report. Westkreuz-Verlag, Berlin, Bonn 2005, ISBN 3-929592-80-0 , pages 15-17.