(Discussion of Hesse, continued from Note Nr. 1621.)
Landgrave Frederick II came to the throne in Hesse-Kassel in 1760. Actually, he did not get to sit down on the throne until 1763, because war kept him out of the Capital. He worked hard at improving the appearance of Kassel. Many of the smaller streets were called "-gasse" which implied a short, alley-like street. He renamed these "-strasse" and changed the names so that they seemed more appropriate for a residential street. The work of improving the paving and the width of the streets also continued. Even the gates into the town were spruced up with new names.
Re-paving was undertaken on a wide scale in this period. Stone sidewalks were built for the convenience of pedestrians and street drainage and cleaning were improved. Animals could no longer be fed or kept on public streets. In 1775, the driving of herds of cows, pigs, and sheep on public streets was also prohibited. Too many farmers still lived and pursued their livelihoods in and around the town for this regulation to stick, however. Frederick had to relent and rescind it in the face of widespread protests. To keep the streets somewhat clean of manure, community barns and stalls were set up on several roads leading into town.
Frederick took Paris as the model in various reform efforts. Rows of ugly, old-style houses were pulled down to make way for more modern buildings, especially in the inner city, and near the Landgrave's palace. The need for construction artisans was so great that immigration of craftsmen was required. Carpenters, roofers, and masons came from far and wide to work in Kassel. A remarkable transformation of the appearance of Kassel took place, until by 1780 the Kassel police commission was claiming that Paris was no cleaner than Kassel.
While Frederick was on the throne, French was the language at the court. Frederick wanted Kassel to become a crossroads between the French culture and German culture.
All of this was very expensive. Frederick financed a lot of it by money earned from renting out soldiers, especially to Britain in the War of Independence. For his own pocket, he set up a lottery. This did so well that an Italian lottery director was able to embezzle 70,000 Taler. This lottery was ended when Frederick's son assumed the throne.
Frederick did found a 400 bed hospital just outside the town gates to serve the poor. He also founded the orphans' and foundlings' homes. He sanctioned merchant fairs and livestock markets. Some of his industrial enterprises were failures.
His son William IX came to power in 1785, with a set of convictions different from his father. William wanted to cut costs, end frivolous aspects of life at court, and remove the influences of the hated French. The state menagerie was sold, opera and ballet were curtailed, and the court orchestra dispersed. Kassel became less of an attraction for visitors while Frederick established schools for poor children. But William did work hard at improving the palace along English lines, not French lines.
(To be Continued.)
(19 Mar 03)
(As of 19 March 2003, John has written 23 Notes relating to the History of Hesse. These writings are scattered and are not contiguous. If you are interested in collecting them all together, here are the numbers of the other Notes he has written so far about Hesse [they are also clickable links]: Note Nr. 1556 , Note Nr. 1557 , Note Nr. 1558 , Note Nr. 1559 , Note Nr. 1560 , Note Nr. 1568 , Note Nr. 1569 , Note Nr. 1572 , Note Nr. 1579 , Note Nr. 1580 , Note Nr. 1582 , Note Nr. 1584 , Note Nr. 1585 , Note Nr. 1586 , Note Nr. 1587 , Note Nr. 1588 . Note Nr. 1616 , Note Nr. 1617 , Note Nr. 1618 , Note Nr. 1619 , Note Nr. 1620 , Note Nr. 1621 . GWD, WebMaster)
We gratefully acknowledge the work of John Blankenbaker who published over 2,500 Germanna History Notes via the Germanna-L@rootsweb.com email list from 1997 to 2008. We are equally thankful to George Durman (Sgt. George) for hosting the list and republishing the notes via rootsweb.com.