Mecklenburg Foundation
The Mecklenburg Foundation is a foundation founded in 1973 in Ratzeburg (Schleswig-Holstein), which moved its headquarters to Schwerin ( Mecklenburg ) in 2009 .
tasks
The foundation is dedicated to the collection and preservation of Mecklenburgica as well as the research and communication of Mecklenburg history. The Mecklenburgica collected by the Mecklenburg Foundation includes objects on the history of the state, a larger art collection with paintings, watercolors, drawings, sculptures, a collection of Mecklenburg coins, and a photo collection with an extensive collection from the Hamburg photo studio A. Mencke (founded by August Mencke ) Mecklenburg manor houses and other views of the town from around 1890. The foundation also has a collection of picture postcards with almost 8,000 individual items. A special focus of the collection is the history of the Mecklenburg Landsmannschaft, which was dissolved in May 2012.
History until 1989
The foundation was established in Ratzeburg in 1973 by the Mecklenburg Landsmannschaft and approved by decree of the Schleswig-Holstein Minister of the Interior on June 1, 1973. The foundation was constituted on August 4, 1973 in Ratzeburg. District Administrator a. D. Gerhard Wandschneider , elected as his deputy District Administrator Klaus Prößdorf . The Prime Minister of Schleswig-Holstein appointed Karl Treml , the Chief Ministerial Councilor, and Walter Wegner and Karl Werner Flint from the Mecklenburg Landsmannschaft to the Board of Trustees. This appointed Peter Heitmann to the board of the foundation. After the death of Gerhard Wandschneider in 1981, Günter Kröpelin, the district administrator of the Duchy of Lauenburg, took over the chairmanship of the foundation board of the Mecklenburg Foundation for almost two decades. The office of chairman of the board was transferred to the school councilor d. D. Hans Juerß handed over.
After its establishment, the Mecklenburg Foundation and Landsmannschaft were given the opportunity to set up their own cultural center in September 1973 at the Ratzeburg Cathedral in today's district museum, formerly the Dompropsteig building, also known as the manor house. In 1982 the foundation received new rooms in the old district building on Ratzeburger Markt, before moving into a spacious domicile in the so-called cathedral barracks, the "Mecklenburg House" in 1986 on the Ratzeburg cathedral courtyard. The Stasi led from 1986 in the District Administrative Rostock on the Foundation two enemy object files to the foundation itself under the code name "Castle" (Stasi BV Rostock AOP 22/92) and to the house of Mecklenburg, Domhof 41, under the code name "roof" (Stasi BV Rostock AOP 21/92).
As a result of extended long-term funding by the state of Schleswig-Holstein, the foundation was able to maintain full-time management since 1989. Klaus Lüders took up his post as a long-time managing director. The doctorate in political science managed the foundation's business until April 2004. Then the foundation had to dismiss the managing director and the part-time secretary due to a lack of funding. Only one part-time worker in the library area remained employed due to the fact that it could not be terminated.
Development since 1989
With the German unification, a conceptual reorientation of the foundation's work took place. The statutes were revised and came into force in 1993 with significant changes. Since then, the state of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, along with the state of Schleswig-Holstein and the Duchy of Lauenburg district, has been involved in promoting the foundation's work and has received seats and votes in the foundation's committees. Ten years later, the federal states stopped funding the foundation or reduced it to a minimum. Those responsible now in the foundation committees around the district administrator of the Duchy of Lauenburg, Gerd Krämer as chairman of the foundation council and Jürgen Meier as chairman of the board had to look for a new perspective for the foundation under these conditions.
After intensive deliberations, the Board of Trustees decided in 2007 to move the headquarters of the Foundation to Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania by 2010. Several Mecklenburg cities had applied for this. The state capital Schwerin was chosen by resolution in 2008. In 2009, the new office was set up there in a wing of the “Schleswig-Holstein House” cultural forum. In 2010, the foundation council was reconstituted in Schwerin on the basis of a revised foundation statute that is now more closely based on the original version. The Minister for Education, Science and Culture of the State of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, Henry Tesch, assumed the office of Chairman of the Foundation Council . It was with Helmuth Frhr. v. Maltzahn, Ulrichshusen, Birgit Hesse, District Administrator of the Northwest Mecklenburg District and Erwin Kudsk, Federal Chairman of the Mecklenburg Landsmannschaft, appointed a new board. Helmuth v. Maltzahn. In the same year, with support from the state of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, a new management team was able to start work in Schwerin. Regine Marquardt became the managing director .
Since then, the foundation has emerged in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania with various projects, exhibitions and publications. She has worked with many partners such as the Historical Commission for Mecklenburg eV or the Museum Association in Mecklenburg and Western Pomerania eV. In December 2014 Ulrike Petschulat took over the management. Florian Ostrop, who has a doctorate in history, has been managing director of the Mecklenburg Foundation since the beginning of 2019.
Exhibition on Mecklenburg regional history and regional studies
In its premises in Schwerin, the foundation is showing a permanent exhibition with the aim of giving an overview of 300 years of Mecklenburg regional history in one hour.
Virtual State Museum Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania
Together with the Museum Association in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, the Mecklenburg Foundation activated the online portal Virtual State Museum Mecklenburg in December 2014. This was expanded several times in the coming years and has represented houses from all over the state as the Virtual State Museum Mecklenburg-Vorpommern since 2017. The digital museum network has united around 400 objects from 51 museum institutions since March 2020. The different histories of the regions of Mecklenburg and (Western) Pomerania are consistently taken into account in the presentation.
Prices
In 1976, the foundation awarded the Friedrich Siems Prize for services to the care of Low German and Mecklenburg songs in choral singing, as provided for in Section 2 of its statutes, and since 1988 a sponsorship award for scientific or artistic work in the care and continuation of Mecklenburg culture. On October 9, 1976 in Ratzeburg, the mixed choir Concordia in Gudow and its choir director Erich Koops were awarded the Friedrich Siems Prize. The German-American literary scholar Liselotte M. Davis received the sponsorship award from the Mecklenburg Foundation on November 17, 1990 during the 1st Mecklenburg Culture Days in Schwerin . The foundation has been awarding the prize for special services to the preservation and communication of Mecklenburg's cultural heritage since 2017.
circle of friends
In 1977, a circle of friends of the Mecklenburg Foundation was established in the vicinity of the foundation , to which 90 members belonged a year later. Their contributions went to the foundation. The foundation's initial capital of DM 50,000 had tripled by 1976 through donations. For the growth of the foundation's assets, it was essential that the foundation was able to benefit from the so-called Western Assets Supply Ordinance issued in 1974 to wind up the Western assets of credit institutions formerly located east of the Elbe. In addition, there were public grants, particularly from the state of Schleswig-Holstein, with which significant purchases to expand the collection and thus the material assets of the foundation could be paid for. At the beginning of the new millennium, the foundation's capital stock had reached DM 1 million, today more than € 513,000.
See also
literature
- Peter Heitmann: 25 years Landsmannschaft Mecklenburg. 1951–1976, published by Landsmannschaft Mecklenburg, Hamburg 1978.
- Hans Jürß: Foundation Mecklenburg Hg., 10 years Foundation Mecklenburg. 1973–1983, Ratzeburg.
- Klaus Lüders: Mecklenburg Foundation in Ratzeburg. Tasks and offers, Schwerin 2000.
- "There and way to Mecklenburg - past and present of a foundation." Flyer for the permanent exhibition of the Mecklenburg Foundation.
- Reno Stutz: The Mecklenburg Foundation. Active for the Mecklenburg cultural heritage for 45 years, Schwerin 2018.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ^ House of Mecklenburg. A house experiences history. Goals and tasks. A work of partnership. In: Mecklenburg , Hamburg, year 28, 1986, issue 9, pp. 3–7