Hainichen is a market town in
Saxony
Saxony, officially the Free State of Saxony, is a landlocked state of Germany, bordering the states of Brandenburg, Saxony-Anhalt, Thuringia, and Bavaria, as well as the countries of Poland and the Czech Republic. Its capital is Dresden, and ...
, Germany. It is located on the river
Kleine Striegis and about north-east of
Chemnitz
Chemnitz (; from 1953 to 1990: Karl-Marx-Stadt (); ; ) is the third-largest city in the Germany, German States of Germany, state of Saxony after Leipzig and Dresden, and the fourth-largest city in the area of former East Germany after (East Be ...
. Hainichen has been shaped by its industrial past.
History
From the foundation until industrial revolution
A first settlement had been mentioned in as ''villa forensis Heynichen''.
Hainichen used to be a place of considerable industry. Its primary manufacture was once that of
flannel
Flannel is a soft woven fabric, of varying fineness. Flannel was originally made from carded wool or worsted yarn, but is now often made from either wool, cotton, or synthetic fiber. Flannel is commonly used to make tartan clothing, blankets, ...
s,
baize, and similar fabrics; at the time it may have been called the centre of this industry in Germany.
On April 23, 1800, a
F5/
TORRO10 tornado
A tornado is a violently rotating column of air that is in contact with the surface of Earth and a cumulonimbus cloud or, in rare cases, the base of a cumulus cloud. It is often referred to as a twister, whirlwind or cyclone, although the ...
devastated Arnsdorf, Dittersdorf and Etzdorf, near Hainichen. Despite its strength, there were no deaths.
The Gellert institution for the poor was established in 1815.
In 1933, a production plant for small delivery vans and minibuses called
Framo moved from nearby
Frankenberg to Hainichen. Since then, the automotive industry has been the most important employer.
Nazi era
An early concentration camp,
Hainichen concentration camp, was established in April 1933 and dissolute in June 1933.
During World War II, a subcamp of
Flossenbürg concentration camp
Flossenbürg was a Nazi concentration camp built in May 1938 by the SS Main Economic and Administrative Office. Unlike other concentration camps, it was located in a remote area, in the Fichtel Mountains of Bavaria, adjacent to the town of Flos ...
was located here, housing female prisoners working for the Framo
enterprise.
GDR
The former plant of the
Framo company was nationalized. The 1960s saw a reingeneering of delivery vans and minibuses under the
Barkas B1000 brand. Hainichen became a major producer of parts for these cars.
After reunification
Production of the B1000 delivery vans and minibuses ceased in 1991.
Population statistics
Source:
[Source from 1998 onwards: Statistical office of Saxony Numbers from 1960 onwards per 31 December.]
Typical for a market town in the east of Germany, Hainichen faces the demographic problem of a steadily declining population.
Leisure and tourism
Sites and buildings of interest
Hainichen is home of a
camera obscura
A camera obscura (; ) is the natural phenomenon in which the rays of light passing through a aperture, small hole into a dark space form an image where they strike a surface, resulting in an inverted (upside down) and reversed (left to right) ...
.
Other important sights are the Gellert museum (literature museum), Tuchmacherhaus (clothier museum) and a communal park.
Hainichen is surrounded by the beautiful valleys of the river
Striegis.
Sports
Hainichen has a communal sports centre with a small indoor pool, a communal outdoor swimming pool and a bowling centre.
Also, there is a cycling track nearby.
Industry
Hainichen is characterised by small and medium-sized businesses.
The largest employer is the car parts maker Metalsa Automotive Hainichen GmbH (formerly ISE Industries Hainichen GmbH) (429 employees in 2005).
Districts
Areas of the city include
* Bockendorf,
* Cunnersdorf,
* Eulendorf,
* Gersdorf,
* Falkenau,
* Riechberg,
*
Siegfried
Siegfried is a German-language male given name, composed from the Germanic elements ''sig'' "victory" and ''frithu'' "protection, peace".
The German name has the Old Norse cognate ''Sigfriðr, Sigfrøðr'', which gives rise to Swedish ''Sigfrid' ...
,
* Schlegel and
* Berthelsdorf.
International relations
Hainichen is
twinned with:
*
Dorsten, Germany
Famous citizens
*Hainichen is the birthplace of
Christian Fürchtegott Gellert (1715–1769), to whose memory a
bronze statue
Bronze is an alloy consisting primarily of copper, commonly with about 12–12.5% tin and often with the addition of other metals (including aluminium, manganese, nickel, or zinc) and sometimes non-metals (such as phosphorus) or metalloids (su ...
was erected in the marketplace in 1865. He was an important poet of the Enlightenment.
*
Friedrich Gottlob Keller
Friedrich Gottlob Keller (27 June 1816 – 8 September 1895) was a German machinist and inventor, who (at the same time as Charles Fenerty) invented the wood pulp process for use in papermaking. He is widely known for his wood-cut machine (used fo ...
(1816–1895), the inventor of the groundwood pulp technique, was born in Hainichen.
More sons and daughters of the town
*
Rainer Simon (born 1941), film director and screenwriter
*
Konrad Zdarsa (born 1944), Bishop of the Diocese of Augsburg
References
External links
Stadt Hainichen/SachsenHistorical Views of Hainichen/Sachsen www.hainichen-damals.de
{{Authority control
Mittelsachsen