Chronicle
Chemnitz is the third largest city in Saxony. It lies at the foot of the Erzgebirge mountains and has expanded over the past century from the Chemnitz river valley over the hills to the west and east.
The Chemnitz river, which gave the town its name and means Steinbach, is formed at the southern boundary of the town by the confluence of the Würschnitz and Zwönitz headwaters.
The area was not populated in early history, but it was crossed by paths, the Böhmische Steige. In 1143, the Benedictine monastery is mentioned in documents with the granting of market rights.
This privilege indicates the royal will to found the town, but is not the founding document of the medieval town. The planned town, which was directly under the control of the king, was probably founded in the first third of the 13th century and soon had a council constitution.
Chemnitz came under Wettin rule as a pawn after 1307 and the margrave granted privileges that strengthened the town economically. Of particular importance is the bleaching privilege of 1357, which authorised four citizens to set up a bleaching plant for the Margraviate of Meissen on the Chemnitz. The margrave also banned the export of yarn, flax, twine and unbleached canvas.
This gave Chemnitz a central position in textile production and trade. The acquisition of land from the monastery in 1402 and the purchase of high and low jurisdiction and customs from the sovereign in 1423 were an expression of the town's economic strength. From 1531, the famous doctor, mineralogist and mining scientist Georgius Agricola worked as a doctor and mayor in the town.
In the 17th century, more than a third of Chemnitz's population worked in textile production, which experienced a major boom in the second half of the 18th century due to the first attempts at factory production and the use of machines. Around 1800, with the early onset of the Industrial Revolution by German standards, Chemnitz was one of the most important industrial centres and developed into the first factory and second trading town in the Kingdom of Saxony.
The city's exterior changed rapidly, the walls were razed, the city gates demolished and the moat silted up. Suburbs and suburbs moved closer together as industry settled there in particular and transport links tied these areas more closely to the city. The opening of the Chemnitz-Riesa railway line in 1852 marked the beginning of the railway network, which was intensively expanded until the turn of the century.
Inner-city transport conditions also improved after 1880 thanks to the use of the horse-drawn railway. New production facilities with modern drive and working machines took up large areas and characterised the city. Chemnitz became a national centre of textile production and mechanical engineering, whose products were among the most sought-after in the world; Chemnitz was the "Saxon Manchester".
The city's population grew enormously. Chemnitz became a major city in 1883, and just 30 years later more than 320,000 people were living here. From 1844 to 1929, the city area was considerably enlarged by the incorporation of 16 suburbs.
The Anger (area behind today's Mercure Hotel) and the Graben (Theaterstraße and Bahnhofstraße to Posthof) were built on, Kaßberg and Stollberger Straße were developed for upmarket housing, and Sonnenberg, Brühl, Südvorstadt and Schlosschemnitz were developed as working-class residential areas.
The city centre also underwent a transformation towards the metropolis:
Shops, offices, banks and insurance companies were built on Markt and Johannisplatz, Poststrasse, Theaterstrasse and Königstrasse. Between 1883 and 1915, the city council built the abattoir, the market hall, the power station, the municipal museum, the fire station, the loan office, the new municipal theatre, the new town hall, the gasworks, the Küchwald hospital, many schools and the cycling track.
While the First World War initially brought a further industrial boom, this was followed by increasing hardship in all areas in the years that followed. Numerous companies in Chemnitz collapsed and the number of unemployed was the highest in comparison to other German cities.
In 1930, the city had the most inhabitants in its entire history, with over 360,000 people working and living in a small area. The Auto-Union company moved its headquarters to Chemnitz in 1936. The motorway was routed close to Chemnitz.
During the Second World War, Chemnitz companies once again increased their production for the armaments industry. From 1940 there were air raid warnings, and in 1945 the heaviest bomber attacks took place in February and on 5 March. By the end of the war, almost 4,000 people had lost their lives in the city and the centre and neighbouring residential areas had been destroyed over an area of more than six square kilometres. Reconstruction was abandoned in the mid-1950s in favour of a new, spacious city centre. The centre was given a completely different look. While the old buildings in the Wilhelminian style neighbourhoods were neglected, large residential areas were built on the outskirts of the city from the mid-1960s onwards.
Karl-Marx-Stadt, as Chemnitz was called from 1953 to 1990, was the centre of GDR mechanical engineering and had a population of 315,000 at the end of the 1980s. Despite further incorporations in recent years, 245,000 people currently live in the city.
The serious political and economic changes that began in autumn 1989 with the collapse of the old power structures led, among other things, to the establishment of local self-government and efficient industrial companies. Today, economic life is characterised by medium-sized, innovative companies on new industrial estates. The construction of new residential and commercial buildings and the redevelopment of traditional residential areas such as Kaßberg and Sonnenberg and listed buildings are changing the cityscape.
Industrial history
As early as 1859, Berthold Sigismund described Chemnitz as "the Saxon Manchester"...
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Inventions
"From Chemnitz to the world" was and is not a one-way street. Innovations were and are always created through the exchange of ideas, people and things. This is also the case in Chemnitz:
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