The Maikäferbund was a late Romantic poetry circle founded by Johanna Mockel (married to Kinkel from 1843) and Gottfried Kinkel in Bonn on June 29, 1840, which existed until March 1847. The aim of this literary circle of the "Vormärz" was to present and discuss poetry and to provide a platform for publications. The group's handwritten journal "Der Maikäfer, Zeitschrift für Nicht-Philister" was published weekly in a single copy and was decorated with many colorful and amusing vignettes.

Initially, it was more of a collection of satirical articles aimed at Bonn's philistine bourgeoisie and eventually became an important literary organ. In addition to the mocking anecdotes and romantic love poems, there are also essays on philosophical-theological, literary and artistic topics. Incidentally, the transcription of the journal was published in four volumes in 1982 in the series "Veröffentlichungen des Stadtarchivs Bonn" on the centenary of Gottfried Kinkel's death.

The Maikäferbund included important representatives of the more recent Rhine Romanticism. Members included Karl Simrock, Wolfgang Müller von Königswinter and Nikolaus Becker. They gave themselves unusual nicknames - for example, Gottfried Kinkel was called "Minister", "Urmaikäfer" or "Urmau", Johanna Kinkel was the "Directrix", "Königin" or "Nachtigall", Karl Simrock called himself "Redlich" and Wolfgang Müller von Königswinter was the "Gewitteranschieber".
the "Gewitteranschieber".

To strengthen the group's sense of togetherness, there was not only a club anthem and an annual foundation festival, but also an Order of the Maybug: A hand-sewn cockchafer about eight centimetres long on a green silk ribbon, which could be worn around the neck and had the words "Halli Hallo" embroidered on its wings. One might wonder whether Johanna Kinkel herself might have done this handiwork. One example can be found in the "Gottfried and Johanna Kinkel" collection (SN 098-182) in the city archives, which consists of 238 items. In addition to the medal, these include personal documents (including business cards, autographs), certificates, correspondence, manuscripts of poems, speeches, stories and compositions as well as newspaper cuttings from the years 1830 to 1876.

To mark the bicentenary of the birth of Gottfried Kinkel, who was born in Oberkassel on August 11, 1815 and was one of the most important personalities of the 1848/49 revolution in the Rhineland, the city archive will shortly be revising the Kinkel Findbuch and making it available online in the near future (www.archive.nrw.de).

St. Adelheid of Vilich (born after 965 and before 970, died February 5, 1015) was the first abbess of Vilich Abbey, which was founded in 978 by her parents Megingoz and Geberga. Adelheid had received the necessary education and experience to run a monastery at the Ursula monastery in Cologne. As abbess, caring for the poor and the education of women in the monastery were of great importance to her. She founded a hospital and a school where the children of the poor were taught and fed. Around 1000, at the insistence of the emperor, Adelheid also became abbess of St. Maria im Kapitol in Cologne, succeeding her deceased sister Bertrada. She became a spiritual advisor to Archbishop Heribert of Cologne. After the death of her parents, Adelheid converted the canoness monastery in Vilich into a Benedictine convent, which changed its status under canon law and affected the ownership of private property as well as changes in clothing and diet.

According to legend, Adelheid asked for rain during a great drought and pushed her abbess's staff into the ground. A spring emerged there, which is still called Adelheidispützchen (= Adelheid's spring) today. The water is said to have healing powers and, due to its high alum content, is said to help with eye diseases in particular. Adelheid died in Cologne on February 5, 1015 after suffering from a serious throat disease. Archbishop Heribert initially refused to allow the body to be transferred to Vilich, but eventually gave in to the Vilich nuns' requests. The body was brought to Vilich by ship and buried in the cloister of the monastery.

30 days after the burial, the first healing miracle took place on a blind man. As further miracles took place at her grave, the number of pilgrims increased, which severely disrupted monastic life. This led to the construction of a new, larger church. The remains of St. Adelheid were reburied in the crypt of the church. In the 13th century, the church was rebuilt and a special chapel was erected for Adelheid's grave. The pilgrims attracted merchants for food and showmen for entertainment. This developed into the "Pützchens Markt", still one of the largest fairs in Germany today. When the shrine and the bones of St. Adelheid were lost after looting in the 16th and 17th centuries, the flow of pilgrims increasingly shifted to the Adelheidisquelle. The care of the pilgrimage was entrusted to the Carmelite Order. In 1696, a pilgrimage booklet was published by a Carmelite:

"Heylsamer Brunn auff der Adelichen Heyden. This is the life of the holy virgin Adelheidis, founder and first abbess of the High-Noble-Frey-Worldly Abbey of Vilich."

The City Archives and the Bonn City History Library hold the 1730 edition. The small-format booklet (8 cm x 12.5 cm) was printed in Mülheim am Rhein by P. A. and J. W. Popper and contains 94 pages with heavy signs of use. It is divided into nine chapters:

1. Canal: Biography of the secular life of St. Adelheid
2. Canal: Adoption of the Rule of St. Benedict
3. Canal: Exercise of mercy and appointment as abbess of Maria im Kapitol in Cologne
4. Canal: Miraculous signs during the lifetime of St. Adelheid
5. Canal: Death of Adelheid and election of a new abbess in Vilich
6. Canal: Description of 7 miraculous signs after the death of St. Adelheid
7. Canal: Description of 12 miraculous healings in the years 1677 to 1678
8. Canal: Novena or nine-day devotion
9. Canal: Chants for pilgrimage

The 12 miracles reported in the 7th canal are depicted in a contemporary engraving. They are also printed in Jakob Schlafke: Leben und Verehrung der Heiligen Adelheid von Vilich, p. 314 - 317.

The 1st healing miracle is described as follows: In 1677, the soldier Thomas Lüttich from the garrison in Bonn, who was lame and dumb and whose fingers had grown into his hand, regained complete health after applying the healing well water for six days and visiting the tomb of St. Adelheid.

Visitors to the tomb of St. Adelheid received a plenary indulgence for their sins on February 5, the feast of St. Adelheid, on June 29, the feast of Peter and Paul, and on one of the three days before the feast of the Nativity of the Virgin Mary or on the feast day itself, September 8. Until the end of the 17th century, pilgrimages took place on the anniversary of Adelheid's death on February 5. At the beginning of the 18th century, the pilgrimages were probably moved to September 8 on the feast day of the Nativity of Mary due to the poor weather conditions in February. Pope Paul VI canonized Adelheid on 27 January 1966. In 2008, she was made the patron saint of Bonn alongside Cassius and Florentius. The veneration of Adelheid continues to this day.

The acclimatization experiments on crops, especially on protein-rich soybeans, which had already been carried out at the Bonn Agricultural University before the First World War, were systematically continued during the Second World War in the service of politics and the war economy, such as the experiment to breed hardy olives for German growing conditions, which was carried out under Koernicke's aegis and financed by the Reich Research Council.

There is no doubt that this work, like so much else, was in the service of science promoted by the National Socialist leadership, and Koernicke, who traveled to southwest Germany in 1944 as a commissioner for the Four-Year Plan, was one of the 14 or so professors in Bonn who had signed the pledge of allegiance of professors at German universities and colleges to Adolf Hitler and the National Socialist state in 1933.

The Bonn City Archive holds the scientific estate of Max Koernicke, which has received little attention to date and also contains partial estates of his father, the botanist Karl Friedrich Körnicke (1828-1908), and his father-in-law, the ancient historian and classical philologist Conrad Cichorius (1863-1932). In addition to Koernicke's extensive studies on plant geography, ecology, anatomy and physiology as well as on questions of agricultural breeding, the collection, which contains numerous private and professional photographs, sketches, lectures, speeches, manuscripts and correspondence, also documents the four research trips that Max Koernicke undertook between 1906 and 1953, mainly to the tropics.

The Buitenzorg scholarship from the Imperial Colonial Office enabled him to travel to Java, the South Moluccas, Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) and Singapore for the first time in 1906/07. On this trip, he also acquired the eight color lithographs with landscape views of Indonesia after drawings by the botanist Franz Wilhelm Junghuhn, which are still in his estate today. In 1910, he visited Ceylon again and also traveled to South India and Egypt.

Koernicke undertook his most extensive research trip in 1933/34 with the help of the A. Gwinner Foundation to Java, Bali, Celebes (now Sulawesi), the Moluccas, Sumatra and to the then active Anak Krakatau. Among the numerous collection items he brought back with him was the tuber of the Aracee Amorphophallus titanum, the titan root, which Koernicke brought with him to Bonn and which blossomed there in the Botanical Garden on April 21, 1937.

Koernicke undertook his last tropical trip to Indonesia in 1953 as president of the German-Indonesian Society with a delegation from the society, which had been founded three years earlier. The previously typewritten finding aid for the Max Koernicke estate (inventory number SN 101) has now been extensively revised and can be viewed immediately on the portal  www.archive.nrw.de (opens in a new tab).

For Easter, we present a highly symbolic postcard that colorfully heralds the arrival of spring. It is a postcard that was sent on April 9, 1898 as an Easter greeting from the renowned Rheinhotel Dreesen - shortly after it was built. The Bad Godesberg hotel in the Rüngsdorf district became famous for its historical significance and its many prominent guests. The Hotel Dreesen commissioned this greeting card from Julius Cramer's printing and paper processing works in Cologne: it is in portrait format and has the standard dimensions of 9x14 cm that were common at the time.

As it was forbidden for the Bonn City Archives and City History Library to write messages on the address side until 1905, the postcard is written on the picture side - that is, in the area of the picture left blank for this purpose. Here we read about a lady who sends her dear Easter greetings from a trip along the Rhine to her "loyal" friend Ella Etscheidt in Barmen.

The picture postcard shows various scenes alluding to Easter and the beginning of spring. In the foreground you can see two hares depicted in detail, about to hide brightly painted Easter eggs in the lush green meadow. According to tradition, the Easter bunny paints the eggs and hides them in the greenery. This was first mentioned in 1682 in the treatise "De ovis paschalibus - von Oster-Eyern" by the physician Georg Franck von Franckenau.

The fertility symbols of the Easter egg and Easter bunny have therefore only been documented as Easter customs in the German-speaking world since the 17th century. However, the custom of dyeing eggs existed long before the introduction of the church's Easter celebrations: in ancient Rome and Greece, eggs were painted or dyed during the spring festivals and given as gifts to friends. In European art history, the egg, like the hare, is a symbol of the resurrection.

The latter is mentioned as a symbol of resurrection as early as the fourth century by church father Ambrose, but it was not until the 19th century that it clearly established itself as a symbolic Easter animal. In a kind of frieze below the Easter bunny scene, the word "EASTER" is flanked by two tree frogs smoking cigars. Here too, the frog symbolizes fertility, with which it was also initially associated in European mythology.

The humorous note of the depiction is also picked up again on the left in the central field: Here you can see two brownies peeking out from behind flowering trees and bushes. The Cologne house ghosts, who performed the work of the citizens at night, can be recognized by their dwarfism and their typical colourful pointed cap.

The Heinzelmännchen became popular as early as 1836 through a ballad by the poet and painter August Kopisch, who transported the original legend from the Siebengebirge mountains to Cologne - incidentally, they are one of the models for the garden gnomes invented at the end of the 19th century. Above the forest scene, the zodiac sign of the bull appears in a round vignette, symbolizing the reawakening of vegetation as an earthbound sign.

To the right, a sky scene frames the space left for the message: Here you can see swallows flying in the azure sky around a birdhouse, which, like the willow catkins depicted, are considered a Christian symbol of spring as well as the resurrection. Interested? - Our postcard collection, which comprises around 15,000 postcards relating to Bonn, can be viewed in the city archive.

Eighty years ago, in 1935, Wilhelm Schmidtbonn's best-known work, "Der dreieckige Marktplatz", was published. The romantic family story, which had its last edition published by Bouvier Verlag in Bonn in 2004, begins in the seventies of the 19th century and is set in Bonn and the surrounding area up to the turn of the century. With this novel, Schmidtbonn pays tribute to his home town of Bonn. He describes the life of the orphan girl Wilhelminchen during the Wilhelminian era: quarrels and reconciliation, a love story and the history of Bonn's trades are all addressed. The first chapter begins with a description of Bonn's market square:

"The city of Bonn has a large marketplace. If you shout at one end, you won't be heard at the other. But the most striking feature is the triangular shape of the square. In 1870, there were still those cute little houses from the Electoral era here, of which only a few remain today - some only two windows wide. The pointed gables each repeated the triangular shape. The child Ludwig van Beethoven had played under these gables. The young man had hurried past them to his beloved Eleonore von Breuning."

The Rhineland is a central theme for Schmidtbonn: "Der dreieckige Marktplatz", together with the book "An einem Strom geboren" (1936), established his fame as a local poet. Schmidtbonn's main motifs are always the Rhenish landscape of Bonn and its inhabitants. His work comprises a total of sixteen dramas and seven novels, as well as poems, novellas and legends that range between naturalism and neo-romanticism. The romanticism of the Rhenish landscape, the world of legends and songs, the world of Ernst Moritz Arndt, Karl Simrock and Ludwig van Beethoven are his poetic roots.

Wilhelm Schmidtbonn, actually Schmidt, was born on February 6, 1876 as the son of a fur trader on the corner of Marktplatz and Bonngasse - in the house where "Hut Weber" is located today. He was one of the best-known and most frequently performed playwrights at the turn of the century. Between 1906 and 1908, he worked as a dramaturge for Louise Dumont at the Schauspielhaus in Düsseldorf. Here he also had great success with his own plays and also published the theater magazine "Masken". His friendship with August Macke, which remained very close until Macke's death in 1914, also dates from this time. Schmidtbonn died on July 3, 1952 in Bad Godesberg and was buried in a grave of honor in the Old Cemetery in Bonn.

In 1966, Schmidtbonn's estate was handed over to the city of Bonn: Since then, the city archives have housed his library with over 750 volumes or facsimiles as well as his correspondence, manuscripts, pictures, documents and articles about Schmidtbonn. (SN 147)

30 years ago, in October 1985, the foreign citizens of the city of Bonn were able to directly elect their members of the Foreigners' Advisory Council for the first time. The necessary election regulations and the guidelines for appointments were passed by the Bonn City Council on June 12, 1985. This was preceded by years of discussion about the right of foreign citizens to participate in local politics. A motion submitted by the SPD parliamentary group on May 29, 1978 concerning the " . . . Social integration of foreign workers living in Bonn and their families in Bonn . . ." can be seen as the starting point. Among other things, the " . . . . participation of foreigners in the municipal decision-making process through the involvement of foreign representatives in municipal committees and district councils, as well as a council of foreigners in the city of Bonn appointed by the foreigners themselves . . .".

On December 17, 1981, Bonn Council decided to set up an advisory council for foreigners. This was made up of 14 members. Seven representatives of foreign citizens were nominated by the welfare organizations and trade unions, seven representatives were appointed from the "Foreign Employees" sub-committee. The chairperson of the "Social Committee" chaired the committee. It soon became apparent that the work of the current Foreign Citizens' Advisory Council was not very effective because it did not reach the majority of foreign citizens.

Following a recommendation by the advisory board and subsequent political opinion-forming processes, the city council decided to elect the foreigners' advisory board on June 12, 1985 together with the new guidelines. The number of members increased to 26 and the composition according to nationality was based on the corresponding population figures. The first election took place on October 13, 1985. The 13 representatives and 13 deputies were made up of the following eight nationalities: Turkey (4/4), Italy (2/2), Spain (2/2), Yugoslavia (1/1), Morocco (1/1), Tunisia (1/1), Greece (1/1), Portugal (1/1).

The Chair of the "Social Committee" continued to chair the meeting. Ruth Hieronymi thus became the first chairperson of the elected Foreigners' Advisory Council. The last time a Foreigners' Advisory Council was elected was in 1999; at the end of the five-year term in 2004, it was replaced by the Integration Council, which was last elected in May 2014.

In anticipation of a good wine harvest in our favorite wine region in 2015 and as a reminder of viticulture in Bonn, we are showing a copperplate engraving from the Graphic Collection of the Bonn City Archives as a time slot in July. The engraving from 1588 shows a bird's eye view of the electoral city of Bonn with less than 4,000 inhabitants "with its churches, monasteries, forts, towers, moats, streets and alleys" as it appeared at the time of the attack by the mercenary leader Martin Schenk von Nideggen on December 23, 1587.

This time, however, our attention is not focused on the turmoil of the Truchsess War, but on the special features of Bonn's city topography. We see the city area surrounded by the fortress wall and the moat in front of it. The wall provides access from the land side through four gates with moat bridges. The names of the city gates are still familiar to us today: Wenzeltor, Kölntor, Sterntor and Stockentor. What only appears remarkable on closer inspection is that almost all open spaces, courtyards, monastery gardens etc. are planted with vines. Vines also seem to dominate the landscape outside the wall.

This impression is confirmed by several other illustrations, such as the cartographic representation by Gerard Stempel, also from 1588 (this is considered to be the oldest true-to-scale cartography of Bonn), and the copperplate engraving by Matthäus Merian from 1646. The maps, plans and graphic sheets show the image of large-scale vine plantations in Bonn and the wider area up to the middle of the 19th century. In contrast, in the lithograph "Bonn aus der Vogelschau 1888" by Ludwig Wagner, the vines seem to have completely disappeared from the landscape.

The Romans brought viticulture to the Rhine via the Moselle. The soldiers and the Roman civilian population in and around the large Roman camps such as Castra Bonnensia were used to drinking wine, and wine was an important part of the agriculture practiced by the Romans from an early stage. The Frankish population groups adopted the tradition of winegrowing and drinking and so a continuous and growing economy developed consisting of the cultivation, trade, serving and transportation of wine. The importance of churches, monasteries and noble courts from the early Middle Ages until secularization at the beginning of the 19th century was very great.

Even if the wine from the Bonn region did not come close to the quality of southern wines, viticulture outweighed fruit and vegetable growing even in such well-known villages as Alfter, Bornheim (strawberries, asparagus) and Meckenheim (apples and other fruit varieties) until the middle of the 19th century. There are different accounts of the varieties and qualities of the wine. There are said to have been good, tasty red wines such as the Kessenich "Leckbart".

On the other hand, white wine was often of such poor quality that it could only have been used as vinegar. This is evidenced by the instructions for the production and preservation of vinegar published in the "Bönnschen Intelligenzblatt" in 1789 in advertisements and essays "zum besten des Nahrungsstandes und zur Beförderung der Aufklärung". The names such as "sour dog", "sour sorrel" or "scabies" for the wine from the foothills speak for themselves.

The causes that gradually led to a reduction in the area under vine and the quantity of wine pressed can be simplified as follows:

1. Industrialization and the growth of the urban population, resulting in a growing demand for
   grain, vegetables and fruit,
2. wars and other unrest and the resulting shortage of labor in the agricultural sector.
   agriculture,
3. railroads and steamships and the resulting cheaper import of more digestible wines from the southern regions.

For the first time, Bonn's economic statistics and reports no longer include any information on wine production for the year 1868. In the Bonn region, the early frosts
early frosts and a phylloxera catastrophe in the 1880s quickly put an end to the
vineyards finally came to a standstill. In today's urban area of Bonn, the revival of the wine-growing tradition has remained a leisure activity, although some newer grape varieties can also produce good drinkable wine here.

Finally, here are four verses from a poem by Landrentmeister Joh. Vorster from 1846:

Ein Liedchen,
particularly suitable for the winegrowers (vintners),
who in the period of about 30 years after 1811
have only once acquired good drinkable wine.
This is written about the first three words of the
Proverb: Psalm 50, 14. pag. 580

1. on the Moselle, Ahr and Rhine
This year is an eleventh wine *)
Pressed out in abundance,
Which the vintners, great and small,
Will certainly be pleasing,
Now they can enjoy it again -

*) This tasted hardly after the pressing (keltern), some time later [however]
absolutely like pure genuine champagne wine.

2. of which came what was lacking
They had long since had, since
They were only given wine vinegar ;
Whereby they consumed their goods
And emptied the money bag,
Like the poorest people

3 Who eat oatmeal instead of meat,
To protect themselves from starvation
To protect themselves in time ;
That she may be delivered from fear and distress,
Which so much presented itself,
To some extent be freed.

4 But patience, it will be better
When from the throne
Our Lord looks upon all,
Who after tribulation shall have reward
Because no scorn
Ever moved them away from Him.

[etc. nine verses in total]

The documents mentioned here and other documents, as well as literature and newspaper articles about
historical and modern viticulture on the Rhine and Ahr, beautiful illustrated books with
views of the Rhine, travelogues, cookbooks and much more about wine can be found in the
the collections of the municipal archive and the municipal history library.

Sources used for the article:

Uhl, Harald: On historical viticulture between Bonn and Cologne, in: Bonner
Geschichtsblätter 62/63 (2013). S. [155] - 167. sign. I e 303-62/63-.

Kuhnen, Manfred Lambertus: Der historische Weinbau in der oberen linksrheinischen KölnBonner Bucht, aufgezeigt am Beispiel des Rebflächenaufkommen im Bonner Bann des 17.
Bonn, 2002, Sign: 2002/513.

Gottfried Kinkel's role in the revolution of 1848/49 makes him one of Bonn's most influential personalities. Gottfried Kinkel was born in Oberkassel on August 11, 1815, the son of Pastor Johann Gottfried Kinkel and Sibylla Marie Beckmann. After studying at the theological faculties in Bonn and Berlin, he became a lecturer at Bonn University.

Not least because of his love for the musician and women's rights activist Johanna Mockel, he became a critic of the Prussian state and the so-called philistine bourgeoisie. Johanna was Catholic, divorced and older than Gottfried. Just one of these characteristics would have been enough to cast the couple's relationship in a bad light - all of them at once made their relationship a scandal in Bonn.

The couple initiated the well-known late Romantic poetry circle "Der Maikäfer" in 1840 and had a strong influence on cultural life in Bonn. The marriage of Johanna, who had previously converted to the Protestant faith, and Gottfried was then the decisive factor in his being forcibly transferred to the Faculty of Philosophy at the University of Bonn in 1845, as he was no longer acceptable to the Faculty of Theology.

Kinkel had already been focusing on art history in his work since 1837 and was an associate professor of art and literary history from 1846. At this time, Kinkel became more politically active and was not only a founding member of the "Neue Bonner Zeitung", but also a founding member of the "demokratischer Verein Bonn" together with Carl Schurz, who later became the US Secretary of the Interior, of which he became president. After the Prussian government dissolved the state parliament in 1848, the democratic association occupied the city gates in Bonn at Kinkel's request. Kinkel was arrested for "incitement to riot", but was acquitted due to a lack of evidence.

Despite massive criticism of the constitution, Kinkel took part in the primary elections for the second chamber of the Prussian National Assembly in February 1849 and was elected as a representative for the Bonn-Sieg constituency. There he belonged to the "far left" and engaged in verbal battles with the deputy Otto von Bismarck. During this time, Kinkel became a symbolic figure for the desire to establish a republic.

In the same year, following the (repeated) dissolution of parliament, Kinkel took part in the Siegburg Zeughaussturm and the Baden-Palatinate uprising. During the capture of the fortress of Rastatt by Prussian troops, which marked the end of the Baden-Palatinate uprising, Kinkel was arrested. After being acquitted by a jury in Cologne on May 2, 1850 for the Siegburg armory storm, he was first sentenced to death by the Prussian military court in Rastatt on August 4, 1850, but then to life imprisonment and imprisoned in Spandau prison. Kinkel became a martyr of the revolution. As early as November 1850, he managed to escape from Spandau with the help of Carl Schurz. His escape took him via Warnemünde, Edinburgh, London and Paris back to London.

In exile, Kinkel laid the foundations for the subject of art history in Great Britain, among other things. After his wife Johanna died in 1858, he married Minna Werner in 1861 and became Professor of Art History at the Zurich Polytechnic (later the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology) in 1866. Gottfried Kinkel died in Zurich on November 13, 1882. He was unable to return to Germany due to a lack of amnesty from the Prussian state.

The Gottfried and Johanna Kinkel Collection (SN098), consisting of personal papers, correspondence, manuscripts of poems, stories and compositions as well as newspaper cuttings, can be found in the city archives.

"Och ich maache mett" is the title of an ink drawing by André Osterritter, which he created for a press release for the opening of Pützchens Markt in 1952. Sitting on a chair, the well-known bridge man is being transported to the fair on a horse-drawn cart. The horse is groaning under the load despite additional support. The parish church of St. Adelheid and the fair's Ferris wheel can be seen in the background.

André Osterritter was born in Bonn on April 26, 1906 and grew up in Beuel, Cologne and Düsseldorf. According to his own account, he attended drawing schools in Bonn, Cologne and Düsseldorf and received private lessons "in drawing and painting caricatures and lettering in the cities of Munich, Saarbrücken and Berlin (Sperling School)". In Berlin, he passed the examination to become a graphic artist.

From 1934 onwards, he worked as a graphic artist in Bonn for the Landesbauernschaft, the Animal Research Institute, the Fortress Engineer Staff 17 stationed at the Westwall and for Dynamit Nobel in Troisdorf. After the war, he worked for the Belgian military authorities and, from April 1, 1948, for the urban planning office of the city of Bonn. On August 8, 1957, he succumbed to the consequences of a heart attack. (Source: Personal file and newspaper article)

Em (Emil) Oelieden is one of the Rhenish Expressionists. Although already recognized at the end of the 1920s, today he belongs to the "forgotten generation of Bonn painters". The self-taught Oelieden was born in Lobberich/Nettetal near the Dutch border. He only devoted himself to painting at the age of 30, having previously worked in the building trade and arts and crafts. As a trained plasterer, he worked for the famous physician Rudolf Virchow (1821-1902), among others, as a molder for anatomical plaster models at the Charité hospital in Berlin.

After phases in which Oelieden worked as a ceramist and silversmith, he finally discovered painting for himself: after initially "dull" and "dark" charcoal drawings in a realistic manner, he approached Impressionism, later he painted in an Expressionist style and there are echoes of Cubist painting. In his late work, Oelieden finally returned to realism; he made his last drawings in silverpoint. Oelieden traveled throughout his life, his study trips took him from Northern Europe to North Africa. He had a particular love for Flanders - a central theme of his work.

In 1908, he moved to Bonn for the first time, where he exhibited at the renowned Cohen art dealership shortly afterwards. Only a short time later, Oeliden set off again - to study in Paris and Antwerp, among other places. He returned to Bonn again and again for short periods. Finally, at the outbreak of the First World War, he fled from Flanders to Bonn. After leaving Bonn again in the early 1920s, he finally settled down with his family in Bonn-Dottendorf in 1930. He died on October 20, 1934 after a tragic accident.

The Bonn period is considered Em Oeliden's main creative phase. During his lifetime, he had numerous exhibitions in Germany and abroad, including a presentation together with works by August Macke (1887-1914) at the "Kölnischer Kunstverein" in 1928, which attests to the recognition of his art. However, the great success did not materialize - despite his exhibition successes, he sold very few paintings.

His two sons were killed in action during the First World War; his daughter, Beatrice Oelieden (1915-1984), managed Em Oelieden's estate, which she transferred to the Bonn City Archives shortly before her death. This included 57 oil paintings, around 1700 watercolors, drawings and lithographs and the extensive written oeuvre (including treatises, fairy tales, poems and aphorisms); also his library; plaster models and much more. Part of the estate, especially the framed oil paintings, was donated to the Bonn City Museum.

Em Oelieden's pictorial imagination is magical and has lost none of its radiance to this day: embroidering women enveloped in a grey-blue mist of color, shimmering red rooftops, black-blue skies, brown-grey church facades against a bright green horizon. An undated watercolor ink drawing (50x40 cm) by Em Oelieden entitled "Blumenzweig", signed at the bottom left, is in the possession of the Bonn City Archives (SN 134; sheet no. 335). Two very similar, one of them almost identical, watercolor ink drawings (SN 134; sheet no. 328; sheet no. 336) with the same title make it clear that this motif was very close to Oelieden's heart. These could be designs for a ceramic decoration. The floral motif shows clear Art Nouveau influences: the slender, flowery ornament is in the foreground.

The curved, flowing and sometimes strongly curved lines are also characteristic of Art Nouveau, as are the elegant, playful yet clear lines, with flowers and tendrils sometimes having geometric shapes. The decorative lines are very flat - without any illusion of space. Even the color scheme, the vermilion red of the blossoms, which contrasts with the sage green of the leaves, is in keeping with Art Nouveau. As far as the chronology of the leaf is concerned, we know that Em Oelieden's first ceramic works (in the Art Nouveau style) were created around 1905/06.

As a time slot for the month of November, we are showing some title pages of St. Martin's procession programs from various decades. They are part of the collection of the Bonn City History Library. These programs are intended as a small example to draw attention to our extensive collection of documents on customs, traditions and folk festivals in Bonn - without forgetting cookbooks, songbooks and dialect literature.

The oldest surviving St. Martin's procession program dates back to 1921 and essentially contains everything that a modern-day program would contain: Line-up of the schools on the Hofgartenwiese (at that time, the orphans and infants separately), the procession route with the destination Münsterplatz and lyrics of Martinmas songs. The date for the raffle of the 50 fat St. Martin's geese is also shown, and a few years later the place and date for the election of the most beautiful torch. St. Martin in the costume of a Roman soldier riding a white horse and the goose cart accompanied by goose boys and goose girls have also been there. Drummers, pipers and 12 bands set the pace. In later years, the subsequent festival on Münsterplatz was rounded off with a St. Martin's bonfire.

The first parade organized by the St. Martin's Festival Committee took place in Bonn back in 1920. The torch and lantern procession for the children was initiated by the parish priest Johannes Hinsenkamp, who had brought the idea from Düsseldorf. However, St. Martin's traditions are much older. Some customs even date back to pre-Christian times. The custom on the eve of St. Martin's Day, as it has been handed down since the 1920s, combines many familiar elements of the autumn festival from very old and somewhat more recent times.

Heischegänge (the Schnörzen or schnoeze) and the lanterns carried along (which were carved from turnips very early on), as well as the St. Martin's bonfire, hark back to very old pagan customs and traditions and remind us of the American (return of?) Halloween. After the St. Martin's procession and the Schnoezen, many families still eat kettle cake, also known as Knüüles or Döppekooche - there are many other names and countless recipes, which even vary according to the district.

Here is the recipe published in the "Kochbuch aus Bonn" by the Vilich-Müldorf grandmother of our late colleague Heinz Krämer:

Ingredients

2 kg peeled potatoes
2 eggs
2 bread rolls soaked in milk
1 large onion
salt, pepper,
breadcrumbs
cornflour as required

Other ingredients according to taste:

125/250 g smoked bacon and/or 125/250 g raisins or three Mettwurst sausages

Preparation

Grate the potatoes and drain. Add the bread rolls soaked in milk, the grated onion, eggs and spices. Work everything into a dough using the cornflour. Now give the dish its individual touch by mixing in raisins and/or finely chopped or sliced bacon or finely chopped sausages. Mix everything together thoroughly.

Grease the (cast-iron) roasting tin well and sprinkle with breadcrumbs. Pour in the mixture and bake at 220 °C for about two hours. At the end, remove the lid to allow a nice crust to form. If there is any left over, the rest can be cut into slices and fried in hot fat.

Originally, a new theater was to be built on the site of the former Sterntor barracks on Mülheimer Platz...

Due to the First World War, however, these plans could not be realized and instead an administration building was planned and constructed on the same site from 1922. This was initially intended for the French occupation authorities based in Bonn, who were using numerous confiscated apartments and business premises to house their own offices. In order to make these rooms accessible to the population again and thus for their original purpose, the city of Bonn negotiated the construction of a purpose-built office building with the Reich government. The city provided the plot of land on Mülheimer Platz free of charge for this purpose, and in return Berlin undertook to cover the construction costs.

The Munich architect German Bestelmeyer (1874-1942), who was one of the founding members of the anti-modernist architects' association "Der Block" in 1928, was commissioned with the structural planning. Bestelmeyer's designs for the 'new' City Hall in Bonn, which can now be found in the city archive's collection of maps and plans, were based entirely on the conservative architectural style of the architectural movement, which was opposed to the avant-garde "Neues Bauen" movement of the time.

On July 5, 1922, the Reich administration approved the construction of the office building. Construction work began in September of the same year, although the occupying authorities rejected the building from the outset. Nevertheless, the work was initially continued and only stopped by the government in December 1923 after the shell of the building had been completed. The city of Bonn then entered into negotiations with the Reich government.

In November 1924, it was finally able to acquire the shell and complete the building, which was now intended for the city administration, by December 1925. Even if the entire administration could not be accommodated in the new building, which still had 163 rooms, the functional building was certainly an improvement for the population, as it was the first time that important administrative branches were housed centrally in one place.

The following offices were located in the City Hall on Bottlerplatz:

First floor: information office, messenger's office, office of the first police district, registry and burial office, rent office, financial and tax administration, tax office.
Second floor: Mayor of Bonn, first deputy mayor, main and personnel administration, department for public education, school administration, civil engineering administration.
Second floor: Building construction administration, building police, property administration, civil engineering administration.
Third floor: Telephone exchange, garden administration, auditing office, surveying office, technical office of the tramway.

Due to a lack of funds, the planned construction of meeting rooms and a conference room for the city councillors on the second floor had to be abandoned, so they continued to meet in the White Hall of the Beethovenhalle. During the Second World War, the roof truss of the City Hall was largely destroyed, but the building itself survived the air raids. At the end of the 1950s, there were plans to extend the building extensively. However, these remained unrealized, not least due to the municipal area reform in 1969 and the further growth of the administration.

Instead, the "New City Hall" was built by 1978. After the inauguration of the new administration building on Berliner Platz, the old building was only used by individual departments of the administration, primarily the youth welfare office and, after major renovation work, the municipal library from 1980. In October of this year, exactly 90 years after the first inauguration, the "Haus der Bildung" was finally opened in the old City Hall on Bottlerplatz, which is now home to the Adult Education Center as well as the City Library.