Wilhelm Ahlers

Wilhelm Karl Georg Ahlers (born January 23, 1810 in Neubrandenburg , † July 13, 1889 ibid) was a German lawyer and politician, mayor of Neubrandenburg.

Life

Wilhelm Ahlers was the eldest son and the eldest of six children of the Neubrandenburg wine merchant and Ratskellerowner Georg Adolf Ahlers (1783–1842). The Neubrandenburg Ratskellerwirt Adolph Ahlers (1814–1864), made famous by Fritz Reuter , was his brother.

Ahlers graduated from the large city school in Neubrandenburg. He completed a law degree at the universities of Heidelberg and Rostock . Initially working as a lawyer in his hometown, he was elected to the magistrate as a lawyer senator from 1846.

In 1863 Ahlers was elected to the magistrate of the Vorderstadt Neubrandenburg as the younger of the two mayors . From 1883 he was Friedrich Brückner's successor in office until his death as First Mayor of Neubrandenburg and as such ex officio landscape deputy in the select committee of the knight and landscape in Rostock . He was the Grand Ducal Mecklenburg-Strelitzscher Privy Councilor.

During his term of office, Neubrandenburg experienced an economic boom, not least due to the city's development into a railway junction after the construction of the Friedrich-Franz-Eisenbahn (1864), the Berlin Northern Railway (1877/78) and the Mecklenburg Southern Railway (1885).

Ahlers was closely associated with the historians Franz Boll and Ernst Boll . He presented the results of his intensive study of historical files in regular lectures in the education association. In 1872 he was one of the founding fathers of the Neubrandenburg Museum Association, which operated what is now the Neubrandenburg Regional Museum in Treptower Tor until the 1930s , and was its association chairman from 1872 to 1878. In addition, Ahlers was a co-founder of the Beautification Association and the Neubrandenburg Animal Protection Association. He was considered a pioneer of the Mecklenburg animal welfare movement and acted as editor of the monthly papers of the associated Mecklenburg animal welfare associations. He attended several international animal welfare congresses and was most recently an honorary member of 25 animal welfare associations. From 1836 he was also a member of the Association for Mecklenburg History and Archeology . After a visit from Rudolf Virchow and his Berlin Society for Anthropology, Ethnology and Prehistory in Neubrandenburg in 1879, from 1880 onwards there was amicable correspondence with Heinrich Schliemann , a playmate of his wife in her childhood.

“His study was his world. Whenever you came to him, you met him doing a scientific paper. The text: Semper fugit - fugit irreparabile tempus, cut out in large black letters, was stuck to the wall as a frieze. - He did not look like the first mayor of the Vorderstadt, but like a scholar buried in his studies - and he was a thoroughly learned man: small, hunched over, dressed in a dressing gown, a cap on his gray head, a long tobacco pipe in his mouth from which the smoke developed in such clouds that it covered everything. "

Wilhelm Ahlers had been married to Friederike von Rußdorf (1812–1893), a pastor's daughter from Ankershagen , since July 6, 1838 . Only two of his four children survived the mayor: his younger son Carl Ahlers (1841–1932) emigrated to New Zealand in 1870, where he established the mayor's only line of descendants; his daughter Frida Ahlers (1845-1932), married in London to John Colam (1827-1910), the secretary of the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA) , died without surviving offspring. The mayor's eldest son of the same name and, like the lawyer in Neubrandenburg and the surrounding area (Friedland, Woldegk), Wilhelm Ahlers (1839–1884), had died before his father after a long illness.

Honors

Wilhelm Ahlers received numerous honors during his lifetime, especially for his achievements in the German and international animal protection movement. He was the holder of the silver medal from Paris and is said to have been the first German to receive the great gold medal from Queen Victoria for outstanding achievements in animal welfare. A few years ago, his descendants presented both medals to the Regional Museum in Neubrandenburg.

The city of Neubrandenburg is planning to establish and award a Wilhelm Ahlers Medal from 2017 . "The Wilhelm-Ahlers-Medal is awarded to personalities who have made a special contribution to the local political, cultural, sporting, economic or social development of the city of Neubrandenburg."

Fonts (selection)

Dorothea Götterich - 1770. (Description of a 4-fold robbery and murder and the last execution in Neubrandenburg). In: Der neue Pitaval , Vol. 33 (1863), 3/9, pp. 154-191.
The notabilities of the animal world, represented in six wreaths of pictures. Wiegandt & Hempel, Berlin 1869.
Historical-topographical sketches from the prehistory of the Vorderstadt Neubrandenburg. Brünslow, Neubrandenburg 1876 [Reprint: Ed. By the Museumsverein Neubrandenburg. Federchen Verlag, Neubrandenburg 1995].
Neubrandenburger Bürgerbuch. Collection of ordinances, local statutes and regulations, as well as statutes of public and non-profit institutions and institutions, cooperatives and associations of the Vorderstadt Neubrandenburg. Brünslow, Neubrandenburg 1881.
Alphabetical-chronological list of those in the official supplement to the Meckl.-Strelitz advertisements up to the end of 1848 as well as those in the grand heart. Meckl.-Strelitzschen Official Gazette for Legislation and State Administration published ordinances and notices. Spalding & Sohn, Neustrelitz 1883.
[under the pseudonym Q. Ofellus jun .:] Philosophy of the stomach in sayings from old and modern times. Schmidt, Leipzig-Reudnitz 1886.
From the quotes folder of the high school director. [Document not known.]

literature

Grete Grewolls: Who was who in Mecklenburg and Western Pomerania. The dictionary of persons . Hinstorff Verlag, Rostock 2011, ISBN 978-3-356-01301-6 , p. 87 f .
Peter Starsy: Ahlers, Wilhelm Karl Georg. In: Andreas Röpcke (Ed.): Biographical Lexicon for Mecklenburg. (= Publications of the Historical Commission for Mecklenburg : Series A). Volume 6, Schmidt-Römhild, Rostock 2011, ISBN 978-3-7950-3750-5 , pp. 21-25.

Web links

Literature about Wilhelm Ahlers in the state bibliography MV
Works by Wilhelm Ahlers in the state bibliography MV

Individual evidence

↑ Entry winter semester 1831, No. 4. in the Rostock matriculation portal
↑ History of the Museum , Regional Museum Neubrandenburg (with picture)
^ Karl Wendt : History of the Vorderstadt Neubrandenburg. Neubrandenburg 1922. p. 231.
↑ The only child from this marriage, Harry Ahlers-Colam (1875–1879), had died as an infant.
↑ Printed matter no .: VI/ 651 - resolution no .: 433/24/17 - subject: statute of the city of Neubrandenburg on the foundation and award of the Wilhelm-Ahlers-Medal of the city of Neubrandenburg ( online PDF )

personal data
SURNAME	Ahlers, Wilhelm
ALTERNATIVE NAMES	Ahlers, Wilhelm Karl Georg (full name); Ofellus, Q jun. (Pseudonym)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	German lawyer and politician, mayor of Neubrandenburg
DATE OF BIRTH	January 23, 1810
PLACE OF BIRTH	Neubrandenburg
DATE OF DEATH	July 13, 1889
Place of death	Neubrandenburg

[1] Entry winter semester 1831, No. 4. in the Rostock matriculation portal

[2] History of the Museum , Regional Museum Neubrandenburg (with picture)

[3] Karl Wendt : History of the Vorderstadt Neubrandenburg. Neubrandenburg 1922. p. 231.

[4] The only child from this marriage, Harry Ahlers-Colam (1875–1879), had died as an infant.

[5] Printed matter no .: VI/ 651 - resolution no .: 433/24/17 - subject: statute of the city of Neubrandenburg on the foundation and award of the Wilhelm-Ahlers-Medal of the city of Neubrandenburg ( online PDF )