Zeppelin Foundation
| Zeppelin Foundation | |
|---|---|
 |
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| Legal form: | Foundation, endowment |
| Purpose: | Promotion of science and research, education and upbringing, art and culture, monument protection, child and youth welfare, elderly care, public health, welfare, traditional customs and homeland care, sport, charitable purposes |
| Chair: | Andreas Brand |
| Consist: | since December 30, 1908 |
| Seat: | Friedrichshafen |
| Website: | www.zeppelin-stiftung.de |
The Zeppelin Foundation , based in Friedrichshafen, is a legally dependent community foundation . The foundation's assets therefore represent a municipal special fund. The sponsor of the foundation is the city of Friedrichshafen.
The foundation holds 93.8 percent of the shares in ZF Friedrichshafen AG and is the owner of Luftschiffbau Zeppelin GmbH and Zeppelin GmbH , which include numerous other subsidiaries. With the income from these so-called foundation operations, the foundation finances charitable and non-profit purposes in accordance with the statutes. The foundation goes back to the so-called zeppelin donation made by the German people in 1908, which was intended to promote airship construction.
activity
According to the statutes, the purpose of the foundation is to promote
- Science and research: u. a. Zeppelin University
- Education and upbringing: u. a. Medienhaus am See, adult education center
- Art and culture: u. a. Music school, Graf Zeppelin House, Zeppelin Museum and School Museum
- Monument protection
- Child and youth welfare: The foundation runs the youth center, the playhouse, the Weilermühle youth leisure center, subsidizes the youth clubs, and continues to finance the construction and operation of 32 day-care centers in Friedrichshafen and the surrounding area.
- Elderly care
- public health: support for Klinikum Friedrichshafen GmbH
- Welfare: Karl-Olga-Haus
- traditional customs and homeland care
- Sports
- Charitable purposes: grants to families, senior citizens and the socially disadvantaged, e.g. B. Grants for family and children's holidays, fuel allowances or allowances in special emergencies
The foundation only pursues charitable and non-profit purposes within the meaning of tax law.
history
On July 1, 1908, the airship LZ 4 built by Ferdinand Graf von Zeppelin , which had only made its maiden voyage on June 20, broke all previous aviation records on a twelve-hour unannounced “Swiss trip” from Friedrichshafen and sparked enthusiasm among the public. On 4th / 5th August another 24-hour long-haul flight on the 700-km circuit Friedrichshafen-Basel-Strasbourg-Karlsruhe-Mainz-Mannheim-Stuttgart-Friedrichshafen was the condition of the Prussian-German military administration for a purchase and for the further financial support of the von Zeppelin operated airship construction. After the time frame had already been exceeded due to an engine failure that had to be repaired on the outward journey, there was another engine failure on the twin-engine aircraft on the return journey, which ultimately led to another break in the journey on August 5th in the morning near Echterdingen . The enthusiasm of the population led to the fact that on the news of the landing in the wider area, including Stuttgart, which had just flown over, businesses and shops closed and crowds of people made a pilgrimage by tram and cogwheel train via Degerloch and on to Echterdingen with the Filderbahn . Trains and stations were completely overloaded despite special trains. A festival-like atmosphere prevailed at the landing site, which was cordoned off by the Württemberg military. Contemporary estimates range from 40,000 to 100,000 people congregating.
In this situation, the airship tore from its temporary anchorage in a gust in the afternoon, escaping hydrogen ignited, presumably due to electrostatic discharge, and LZ 4 went up in flames. A continuation of the airship development of Zeppelin, who had invested almost all of his private fortune, initially seemed no longer possible. Spontaneously, however, donations were made to continue building the airship. Zeppelin was collected at the scene of the accident. Newspapers picked up on this and issued appeals for donations. The willingness to donate went through all shifts. Within a few days it became clear that sums would certainly be raised that would enable the sustainable continuation of airship construction. As a result of this miracle of Echterdingen , the Zeppelin, who was not very inclined to do so, Kaiser Wilhelm II. Was forced to symbolically position himself at the head of the donors as part of a collection organized in the tradition of Wilhelmine donation practice: he was the first donor to make a contribution of 10,000 marks to the German Reich Committee to raise the national airship building fund for Count von Zeppelin , whose honorary president was Crown Prince Wilhelm , whose presidium included Chancellor Bülow , State Secretary for the Interior Bethmann Hollweg and Prussian War Minister Eine and which set up an advisory board on the question of the use of funds. This Prussian appropriation was judged by many Zeppelin supporters as inappropriate and because of the well-known antipathies against the “fool of Lake Constance” as hypocritical, especially in southwest Germany.
The National Airship Construction Fund for Count Zeppelin was created in Stuttgart . Overall, the people and the economy donated a good six million marks, of which the Reich Committee , whose individual donations were limited to 10,000 marks due to the emperor's specifications, raised about half. The largest single donations came from industrialists and industry: Eduard Arnhold 100,000 marks, Karl Lanz 50,000 marks, Siemens & Halske , AEG , Theodor von Guilleaume and Guido Henckel von Donnersmarck 10,000 marks each. The donations of the Association of German Engineers of 50,000 marks and its colleges in Berlin and Stuttgart of 30,000 and 20,000 marks, respectively, were unusual . Wilhelm II of Württemberg also donated 20,000 marks. Many well-off citizens donated between 10 and 100 marks.
On September 8, 1908, Zeppelin then founded Luftschiffbau Zeppelin GmbH and, with a deed of December 30, 1908, initiated the establishment of the Zeppelin Foundation , which was completed on April 16, 1909 with state recognition. The donations and the acquisitions made from them were brought into the foundation as assets. The large volume of these assets enabled a correspondingly broad formulation of the foundation's purpose, which the foundation was then to use strategically to build up suppliers and buyers: the purpose of the foundation was the construction of airships, the promotion of airship travel and participation in companies whose object was the construction or sale of aircraft. It was also stipulated that if the original purpose of building airships could no longer be fulfilled, the foundation's assets should go to the city of Friedrichshafen and be used by them for charitable purposes.
The original purpose of the foundation remained until the end of the Second World War. In the two world wars in particular, the foundation made significant contributions to arms production in the spirit of the founder. On March 1, 1947, the responsible Wuerttemberg-Hohenzollern regional directorate abolished the Zeppelin Foundation as a legal entity under private law at the instigation of the occupying power. The foundation's assets fell to the city of Friedrichshafen, which continued to run the foundation as a local foundation with no legal capacity in accordance with the requirements of the original deed of foundation. The company holdings in the Zeppelin Group ( Luftschiffbau Zeppelin GmbH and its management holding Zeppelin GmbH including subsidiaries, with a focus on trading and leasing construction machinery) and in the automotive supplier ZF Friedrichshafen AG , also a former subsidiary of Luftschiffbau Zeppelin GmbH, were in principle included maintained.
The great-grandson of the founder, Albrecht von Brandenstein-Zeppelin , succumbed in the first instance to the Sigmaringen Administrative Court in 2020 with a lawsuit to declare the dissolution order of 1947 null and void and to request that the Zeppelin Foundation be restored with the return of its shares. The administrative court denied his right to bring an action without deciding on the matter.
literature
- City of Friedrichshafen (Ed.): Zeppelin 1908 to 2008. Foundation and company . Piper Verlag, Munich a. a. 2008, ISBN 978-3-492-05202-3 , ( series of publications by the Friedrichshafen City Archives 7).
- Bernd Klagholz: The day of Echterdingen: Zeppelin LZ 4 on the Fildern: Disaster and a new beginning of airship travel. Leinfelden-Echterdingen: Archives of the City of Leinfelden-Echterdingen, 1998 (Publications of the City Archives Leinfelden-Echterdingen 5)
Web links
- Accountability report 2009 of the city of Friedrichshafen with accountability report for the budget of the Zeppelin Foundation (PDF; 4.6 MB)
- Zeppelin Foundation's 2010/11 budget (PDF; 3.8 MB)
Individual evidence
- ↑ Articles of Association (PDF)
- ↑ Articles of Association of the non-legal foundation with the name Zeppelin Foundation with headquarters in Friedrichshafen (PDF; 495 kB)
- ↑ a b "The happiest of all accidents": The day of Echterdingen - catastrophe and a new beginning in airship travel. - Website of the city of Leinfelden-Echterdingen on Graf Zeppelin
- ↑ Michael Dorrmann: Eduard Arnhold (1849-1925). Berlin: Akademie-Verlag, 2002
- ↑ Nobility destroyed. Trial of the Zeppelin Foundation.