Synagogue (Mehlem)

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The synagogue in Mehlem , a current part of the Bad Godesberg district of Bonn , was built in 1874/75 and destroyed by the National Socialists in 1938. It was located on Meckenheimer Strasse on what is now the property of the École de Gaulle-Adenauer .

history

A Jewish community in Mehlem had existed since the first half of the 19th century and was part of the Godesberg synagogue community, which already had its own house of worship. After a Jewish cemetery was laid out in the town in 1868 , the construction of its own synagogue followed as a further step towards making the Mehlem community independent. It was built in 1874/75 on a piece of land provided by the brothers Abraham and Cossmann Levy, who belonged to the Jewish community, to the east of what was then the primary school. Its inauguration took place on September 18 and 19, 1875.

Even before the Nazi era , the community gave up the use of the synagogue towards the end of the 1920s due to a decline in the local Jewish population. The heirs of the original founder of the synagogue property, Cossmann Levy, therefore conducted sales negotiations with the then city of Bad Godesberg in the spring of 1938. The then mayor Heinrich Alef recommended that the city council buy the property in the expectation of being able to convert the former synagogue into a gymnasium. However, this change of use did not take place, so that the Mehlem synagogue was also destroyed by arson in the course of the November pogroms 1938 on November 10th.

The former site of the synagogue was incorporated into the adjoining school site and (as of 1987) used as an orchard. Since September 7, 1990, a plaque commemorates the former synagogue on the wall of today's German-French school (Meckenheimer Straße 45). In 2010, during construction work for a kindergarten on the site, charred bricks were found as remnants of the destroyed building as well as rusted metal decorations, which presumably also belonged to the synagogue.

  • Memorial plaque at the École de Gaulle-Adenauer

architecture

The Mehlem synagogue was a 128.25 m² (floor area) large, dark red brick building , about 18 meters south of Meckenheimer Straße - accessible from there via a path lined with spherical acacias - and about 8.5 meters east of the Mehlem elementary school on a 3, 62 acres of land. It had 72 seats made of precious mahogany wood , as well as a women's gallery and was also equipped with a valuable crystal chandelier. There is no pictorial representation of the former synagogue, so there is no detailed description of the building.

literature

  • Hans Kleinpass: On the history of the former synagogues in Godesberg and Mehlem . In: Godesberger Heimatblätter: Annual issue of the Association for Home Care and Home History Bad Godesberg eV , ISSN  0436-1024 , Volume 25 (1987), Association for Home Care and Home History Bad Godesberg , Bad Godesberg 1988, pp. 146–173.
  • Elfi Pracht : Jewish cultural heritage in North Rhine-Westphalia. Part I. Cologne district (= contributions to the architectural and art monuments in the Rhineland , Volume 34.1). Cologne 1997, ISBN 3-7616-1322-9 , p. 488.
  • Klaus-Dieter Alicke: Lexicon of the Jewish communities in the German-speaking area. 3 volumes. Gütersloher Verlagshaus, Gütersloh 2008, ISBN 978-3-579-08035-2 . ( jewische-gemeinden.de ).

Web links

Commons : Synagoge (Mehlem)  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

References and comments

  1. ↑ former address: Meckenheimer Straße 39a
  2. ↑ a b jewische-gemeinden.de - Bad Godesberg
  3. ^ A b Hans Kleinpass: On the history of the former synagogues in Godesberg and Mehlem . P. 166.
  4. ↑ Hans Kleinpass: On the history of the former synagogues in Godesberg and Mehlem . P. 170.
  5. ↑ a b c Hans Kleinpass: On the history of the former synagogues in Godesberg and Mehlem . P. 171.
  6. ^ Hans Kleinpass: Memorial plaque for the former synagogue in Mehlem . In: Godesberger Heimatblätter: Annual issue of the Association for Home Care and Home History Bad Godesberg eV , ISSN  0436-1024 , Volume 28 (1990), Association for Home Care and Home History Bad Godesberg , Bad Godesberg 1991, p. 173.
  7. ↑ Martin Stankowski , Ulrike Puvogel: Memorials for the victims of National Socialism. Baden-Württemberg, Bavaria, Bremen, Hamburg, Hesse, Lower Saxony, North Rhine-Westphalia, Rhineland-Palatinate, Saarland, Schleswig-Holstein (= memorials to the victims of National Socialism. Volume 1). 2nd, revised and expanded edition. Federal Agency for Political Education, Bonn 1995, ISBN 3-89331-208-0 , p. 502.
  8. ^ Mehlem: Findings from Jewish history , General-Anzeiger , April 7, 2010
  9. ↑ Complaint about the condition of the memorial in Mehlem , General-Anzeiger , March 13, 2019

Coordinates: 50 ° 39 ′ 32.5 ″  N , 7 ° 11 ′ 20.4 ″  E