Wilhelm Ritter (civil engineer)

Wilhelm Ritter

Karl Wilhelm Ritter (born April 14, 1847 in Liestal ; † October 18, 1906 in Rämismühle ) was a Swiss civil engineer and professor at the Swiss Federal Polytechnic in Zurich .

Life

Wilhelm Ritter, whose family came from Altstätten , went to school in Liestal and Basel . His brother Hermann Ritter (1851–1918), who was four years younger than him, was an architect and managed, among other things, the company Philipp Holzmann & Cie. in Frankfurt am Main . From 1865 Wilhelm Ritter studied civil engineering at the federal polytechnic school, today's ETH, in Zurich, which he graduated with a diploma in 1868. He then worked for about a year as an engineer building the Alföld Railway in Hungary . After his habilitation as a private lecturer in engineering in 1870, he worked as an assistant to Karl Culmann in Zurich until 1873 . Richter was involved in the design of the Pilatus Railway with Eduard Gerlich . In 1873 Ritter was appointed professor of engineering at the Riga Polytechnic . After Culmann's death, his chair was split up due to its large scope. In 1882, Ritter was appointed professor for graphic statics and bridge construction at the Zurich Polytechnic , while Gerlich took over the subjects of railway construction and operation. His most famous students were Robert Maillart , Othmar Ammann and Alexander Acatos . Between 1887 and 1891 he was director of the Polytechnic. After Ritter had refused a call to the Technical University of Munich , the city of Zurich made him an honorary citizen in 1889. In 1896 he was awarded an honorary doctorate from the University of Zurich . Due to an illness, he resigned from his teaching post in the fall of 1904 and died two years later in a sanatorium. His successor at the Polytechnic was Emil Mörsch .

Services

Among other things, Ritter was significantly involved in the further development of reinforced concrete construction . Together with Ludwig von Tetmajer , he wrote the report on the railway accident at Münchenstein . He also published the second volume, the application part of the book Die Graphische Statik von Culmann. The work, which consists of four parts, arose from the fragmentary estate of Culmann, whereby Ritter could only be named as the editor, although he was the main author.

Works

• Applications of graphic statics according to Professor Dr. C. Culmann edited by W. Ritter:
  Part 1: The forces acting inside a beam
  Part 2: The framework
  Part 3: The continuous beam
  Part 4: The arch.
  Meyer & Zeller, Zurich 1888–1906

literature

• Rudolf Mumenthaler: Karl Wilhelm Ritter. In: Historical Lexicon of Switzerland .
• Urs Widmer: Ritter, Karl Wilhelm . In: Isabelle Rucki and Dorothee Huber (eds): Architects Lexicon of Switzerland - 19./20. Century Basel: Birkhäuser 1998. ISBN 3-7643-5261-2
• EM: Wilhelm Ritter . Nekrolog in: Schweizerische Bauzeitung , Vol. 48 (1906), pp. 204–206 doi : 10.5169 / seals-26179
• Christine Lehmann, Bertram Maurer: Karl Culmann and the graphic statics . Ernst & Sohn , Berlin 2006, ISBN 978-3-433-01815-6 .
• Karl-Eugen Kurrer : Elastic or plastic - that is the question here . In: History of structural engineering. In search of balance , 2., strong ad. Edition, Ernst & Sohn , Berlin 2016, ISBN 978-3-433-03134-6 , p. 463, p. 584, p. 647 f., P. 677, p. 682, p. 688, p. 700, P. 769, p. 787, p. 794, p. 804, p. 1027 (biography).