Richard Hartmann – the Saxon "Locomotive King"

The museum is closed on Saturday, 13.02.2010.

Special Exhibition of Saxon Museum of Industry in Chemnitz
5th February to 24th May 2010

It sounds like a fairy tale: on his voyage from Alsace to Central Saxony, an indigent journeyman works his way up to become an entrepreneur. Richard Hartmann would have had his 200th birthday on 8th November 2009.

This special exhibition at the Dresden Transport Museum is dedicated to Richard Hartmann's life and accomplishments, thus his merits as a successful manufacturer and pioneer of industrialization in Saxony. Special emphasis is given to locomotive manufacturing, an area in which Mr. Hartmann achieved worldwide recognition, as well as to his connections to Dresden.

Richard Hartmann, born in Alsace, came to Chemnitz in 1832 with only three silver coins in his pocket. With diligence, an entrepreneurial spirit and vision he built an impressive business empire. In 1837 Hartmann became owner of a small workshop, and 30 years later thousands of workers produced locomotives, machine tools, turbines and spinning frames under his leadership. At the time, it was said that “Hartmann simply makes anything.“

In 1848, he named his first steam engine “GLÜCK AUF“ (Good luck!). Until 1929, 4,699 locomotives manufactured in Chemnitz were sold all over the world. The oldest of the 101 preserved locomotives, the socalled MULDENTHAL (1861), is at display at the Dresden Transport Museum.

Less happy, however, was Hartmann about the missing rail connection. Until Chemnitz got a train station in 1852, the steam engines had to be disassembled and then transported on carriages to Leipzig. For the following 56 years, the locomotives were transported through Chemnitz on horsedrawn carts, which was always a sensational spectacle.

After his wife's death, Richard Hartmann retired to private life. In 1877, he built a villa in the gorgeous Elbe valley, in Laubegast, that he used as his summer residence. Later, his son Gustav lived there, who - after the death of his father in 1877 - became his successor in the supervisory board. The company kept doing well until, in 1930, the world economic crisis led to the end of locomotive construction.