Georg Krauß, from 1905 ''Ritter von Krauß'' (25 December 1826 – 5 November 1906) was a German industrialist and the founder of the

Krauss Krauss is a German surname. Notable people with the surname include: * Alison Krauss (born 1971), American bluegrass musician * Alexander Krauß (born 1975), German politician * Alexis Krauss (born 1985), musician of the noise pop duo Sleigh Bells ...

Locomotive Works (''Locomotivfabrik Krauß & Comp.'') in

Munich Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the States of Germany, German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the List of cities in Germany by popu ...

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

and

Linz Linz ( , ; cs, Linec) is the capital of Upper Austria and third-largest city in Austria. In the north of the country, it is on the Danube south of the Czech border. In 2018, the population was 204,846. In 2009, it was a European Capital of ...

Upper Austria Upper Austria (german: Oberösterreich ; bar, Obaöstareich) is one of the nine states or of Austria. Its capital is Linz. Upper Austria borders Germany and the Czech Republic, as well as the other Austrian states of Lower Austria, Styria, a ...

. The spelling of the company name was later changed from ''Krauß'' to ''Krauss'', once the form of the name in capital letters on the company's emblems had become established.

Early Beginnings

Krauß was born in

Augsburg Augsburg (; bar , Augschburg , links=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swabian_German , label=Swabian German, , ) is a city in Swabia, Bavaria, Germany, around west of Bavarian capital Munich. It is a university town and regional seat of the ' ...

as the eldest child of four, to master weaver, Johann Georg Friedrich Krauß and his wife Anna Margarethe, née Stahl. After attending primary school, he went to the Royal Polytechnic School, founded in 1833 (today

High School). After completing his education he worked temporarily in the Maffei Locomotive Works in Munich, then for the

Royal Bavarian State Railways The Royal Bavarian State Railways (''Königliche Bayerische Staats-Eisenbahnen'' or ''K.Bay.Sts.B.'') was the state railway company for the Kingdom of Bavaria. It was founded in 1844. The organisation grew into the second largest of the German ...

(''Königlich Bayerische Staatsbahn'') in

Hof, Germany Hof () is a town on the banks of the Saale in the northeastern corner of the German state of Bavaria, in the Franconian region, at the Czech border and the forested Fichtelgebirge and Frankenwald upland regions. The town has 47,296 inhabitants, th ...

Kempten Kempten (, (Swabian German: )) is the largest Town#Germany, town of Allgäu, in Swabia (Bavaria), Swabia, Bavaria, Germany. The population was about 68,000 in 2016. The area was possibly settled originally by Celts, but was later taken over by th ...

and

Lindau Lindau (german: Lindau (Bodensee), ''Lindau am Bodensee''; ; Low Alemannic German, Low Alemannic: ''Lindou'') is a major Town#Germany, town and Lindau (island), island on the eastern side of Lake Constance (''Bodensee'' in German) in Bavaria, Ge ...

. A decisive step in his development was his job as a master machinist with the Northeast Railway (''Nordostbahn'') in Zurich, where he built his first four locomotives. From then on he was already preparing for the founding of his factory in Munich. In spite of strong opposition from the already established

Joseph Anton von Maffei Joseph Anton von Maffei (4 September 1790 – 1 September 1870) was a German industrialist. Together with Joseph von Baader (1763–1835) and Theodor Freiherr von Cramer-Klett (1817–1884), Maffei was one of the three most important railway pione ...

he obtained the necessary capital to found the factory on the Marsfeld in Munich-Neuhausen on 17 July 1866, a satellite factory at Munich South station in 1872 and another works in 1880 in

(

Austria Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...

) in order to avoid the high import taxes of the

Danube monarchy The Habsburg monarchy (german: Habsburgermonarchie, ), also known as the Danubian monarchy (german: Donaumonarchie, ), or Habsburg Empire (german: Habsburgerreich, ), was the collection of empires, kingdoms, duchies, counties and other polities ...

. A locomotive built by Krauss, the "Degen und Wiegand KARL" (serial number 2062) was constructed in 1888. Degen und Wiegand were a construction company in Kiel. The locomotive was sold to and used by various construction companies, including Hermann Bachstein. It was also used for rail services on the Sued Harz Eisenbahn. The Centrale Limburgsche Spoorweg (CLS) obtained the

locomotive A locomotive or engine is a rail transport vehicle that provides the Power (physics), motive power for a train. If a locomotive is capable of carrying a payload, it is usually rather referred to as a multiple unit, Motor coach (rail), motor ...

through purchase in 1916. It remained in service until 1921 and was

scrap Scrap consists of Recycling, recyclable materials, usually metals, left over from product manufacturing and consumption, such as parts of vehicles, building supplies, and surplus materials. Unlike waste, scrap Waste valorization, has monetary ...

ped in 1923.

Further Successes

Krauß was not just a successful locomotive manufacturer, but also supported other technological developments, like the first refrigerators by Linde. He took part in the expansion of railway lines in the

Saxony Saxony (german: Sachsen ; Upper Saxon: ''Saggsn''; hsb, Sakska), officially the Free State of Saxony (german: Freistaat Sachsen, links=no ; Upper Saxon: ''Freischdaad Saggsn''; hsb, Swobodny stat Sakska, links=no), is a landlocked state of ...

Thuringia Thuringia (; german: Thüringen ), officially the Free State of Thuringia ( ), is a state of central Germany, covering , the sixth smallest of the sixteen German states. It has a population of about 2.1 million. Erfurt is the capital and larg ...

and

Alsace Alsace (, ; ; Low Alemannic German/ gsw-FR, Elsàss ; german: Elsass ; la, Alsatia) is a cultural region and a territorial collectivity in eastern France, on the west bank of the upper Rhine next to Germany and Switzerland. In 2020, it had ...

, in the conversion of the horse-drawn tramways to steam operations in Munich and Vienna, the building of the

Chiemsee Chiemsee () is a freshwater lake in Bavaria, Germany, near Rosenheim. It is often called "the Bavarian Sea". The rivers Tiroler Achen and Prien flow into the lake from the south, and the river Alz flows out towards the north. The Alz flows in ...

Railway and the establishment of the

Lokalbahn AG The Lokalbahn AG company (''Lokalbahn Aktien-Gesellschaft''), or 'LAG' for short, was a private company based in Munich, Bavaria, whose lines of business was the construction and operation of branch lines (the so-called ''Lokalbahnen'' or ''Sekundä ...

. In addition in 1876 he was one of the founders of the present day Institute of German Engineers, the VDI, (''Verein Deutscher Ingenieure'') and in 1903 generously supported the creation of the

Deutsches Museum The Deutsches Museum (''German Museum'', officially (English: ''German Museum of Masterpieces of Science and Technology'')) in Munich, Germany, is the world's largest museum of science and technology, with about 28,000 exhibited objects from ...

with 100,000 marks and the repurchase of his first locomotive "Landwührden".

Twists of Fate

In 1876 his first wife Lydia died and so too did his only son, Conrad, after an accident in 1885, whereupon Krauß converted his firm into public limited company and drew back from active business leadership. He remained chairman of the board until his death, however.

Honours

As early as 1880 he was awarded the Knight's Cross 1st Class of the Grand Duchy of Saxony-Weimar, as well as the title of Royal Bavarian Industrialist (''Königlich bayerischer Kommerzienrat'') from

King Ludwig II of Bavaria King is the title given to a male monarch in a variety of contexts. The female equivalent is queen, which title is also given to the consort of a king. *In the context of prehistory, antiquity and contemporary indigenous peoples, the tit ...

for his services. In 1903 followed the Order of Merit of Holy Michael 3rd Class, and with the conferral of the Knights Cross of the Royal Order of Merit of the Bavarian Crown he rose on 6 March 1905 to ranks of the nobility. The

Technical University of Munich The Technical University of Munich (TUM or TU Munich; german: Technische Universität München) is a public research university in Munich, Germany. It specializes in engineering, technology, medicine, and applied and natural sciences. Establis ...

awarded him the title of

Doctor of Engineering The Doctor of Engineering, or Engineering Doctorate, (abbreviated DEng, EngD, or Dr-Ing) is a degree awarded on the basis of advanced study and a practical project in the engineering and applied science for solving problems in the industry. In the ...

honoris causa and the VDI gave him the Grashof commemorative coin.

A Life with Foresight

In 1905 Krauß decided to move the location of the factory from the crowded town centre out to Allach, from where its successor organisation still operates today. Sadly he did not live to see either the completion of the

or the move to Allach. On 5 November 1906 the manufacturer Georg von Krauß died shortly before his 80th birthday in Munich. His friend and one of his first co-workers,

Carl von Linde Carl Paul Gottfried von Linde (11 June 1842 – 16 November 1934) was a German scientist, engineer, and businessman. He discovered a refrigeration cycle and invented the first industrial-scale air separation and gas liquefaction processes, whi ...

, took over the chair of the board. His factory made 7,186 locomotives from 1866 until its merger with the bankrupt Maffei locomotive works in 1931.

References

Sources

* Siegfried Baum: Die Augsburger Localbahn, EK Reihe Regionale Verkehrsgeschichte Band 30; Freiburg: Eisenbahn Kurier 2000, * Dr. Ing. Georg R. v. Krauss +, in:

Die Lokomotive Die, as a verb, refers to death, the cessation of life. Die may also refer to: Games * Die, singular of dice, small throwable objects used for producing random numbers Manufacturing * Die (integrated circuit), a rectangular piece of a semicond ...

(Wien), Jahrgang 1906, Seite 213 * Alois Auer (Hrsg.): ''Krauss-Maffei. Lebenslauf einer Münchner Fabrik und ihrer Belegschaft.'' 3K-Verlag, Kösching 1988.

External links

* https://web.archive.org/web/20070930083707/http://www.verein-der-ingenieure.de/ueber_uns/geschichte.html * http://www.werkbahn.de/eisenbahn/lokbau/museum/pres_krauss.htm * http://www.dampflokomotiven.net/Html/Krauss.html * Karl Schmidt, Krauss-Maffei, in: Historisches Lexikon Bayerns http://www.historisches-lexikon-bayerns.de/artikel/artikel_44907> (20.02.2007) {{DEFAULTSORT:Krauss, Georg German railway entrepreneurs German railway mechanical engineers 1826 births 1906 deaths Businesspeople from Augsburg Businesspeople from Munich Bavarian nobility 19th-century German engineers 19th-century German businesspeople Engineers from Bavaria