Friedrich Engelhorn

Friedrich Engelhorn was born on 17 July 1821 in Mannheim, where his father was a head brewer and pub owner. At the age of nine, he started attending the local lyceum, but left the school four years later and took up a 3-year apprenticeship to become a goldsmith. In 1847 after travelling to Mainz, Frankfurt, Munich, Vienna, Geneva, Lyon and Paris as a wandering journeyman, Engelhorn opened a goldsmith’s shop in his hometown.

Due to economic upheaval resulting from the 1848 revolution, his goldsmithery business began to deteriorate, which led him in summer of 1848 to establish with his two partners in Mannheim a private gasworks that produced and sold bottled gas used for lighting pubs and workshops. Because of his experience with gas manufacture, in 1851 Engelhorn was put in charge of building a new public gasworks in Mannheim; subsequently he became its manager after the works started operation in December of that year.