Rudolf August Oetker (20 September 1916 – 16 January 2007) colloquially also R.A. Oetker was a German industrialist, businessman, ship owner and philanthropist. Most notably he turned Dr. Oetker, founded by his grandfather August Oetker, into a multinational food conglomerate. During World War II, Oetker was a member of the Nazi Party.[1]
Rudolf August Oetker | |
|---|---|
.jpg) Oetker in 1966 | |
| Born | 20 September 1916 |
| Died | 16 January 2007 (aged 90) |
| Occupation(s) | Owner and CEO of Oetker-Gruppe |
| Political party | National Socialist German Workers' Party (1930s–1945) |
| Children | Richard Oetker |
| Relatives | August Oetker (grandfather) Richard Kaselowsky (stepfather) |
| Family | Oetker family |
Early life and education
editOetker was born 20 September 1916 in Bielefeld, German Empire, the second child of Rudolf Oetker (1889–1916), a chemist, who fell in Verdun before his son was born, and Ida Oetker (née Meyer; 1891–1944). He had an older sister; Ursula Oetker (1915–2005).
Oetker served and volunteered in the Waffen-SS from 1941 to 1944. After his stepfather, Richard Kaselowsky, was killed in an air raid, Oetker became the president of his family-run business in 1944. The business was inherited from his grandfather, August Oetker, who invented a popular mixture of baking powder.[2][3][4][5]
Career
editAfter the war, Oetker was interned in the Staumühle internment camp near Paderborn. When his SS blood group tattoo was discovered under his left armpit, he was brutally beaten by the guards. For years after the war, Oetker would need a cane to walk. Following his release in 1947, he would elevate the company to a household name in Germany today. The Oetker-Gruppe was one of the symbols of the post-World War II recovery effort in the country.[6] In 1960s, Oetker funded Stille Hilfe, a relief organization for the SS veterans, fugitives, and convicted war criminals.[7]
Oetker retired as executive director in 1981, turning the position over to his son August Oetker (jr.).
In 2006, his net worth was estimated by Forbes at US$8.0 billion.[8]
Personal life
editIn 1939, Oetker married firstly to Marlene Ahlmann (1915–2002), originally from Cologne which also hailed from an industrial family. Her family owned Carlshütte, a iron foundry, which employed up to 3,000 people.[9] They had one daughter;
- Rosely Oetker (born 1940), who would later serve on the Landtag of Baden-Württemberg, married to Folkart Schweizer (born 1940); three children and five grandchildren.
In 1943, he married secondly to divorcee Susanne Schuster (née Jantsch; 1922-2012), who would later marry Karl, Prinz zu Salm-Horstmar (1911–1991). They had four children;
- August Oetker (born 1944)
- Bergit Iris Ursula Oetker (born 1947), firstly married to Christoph von Luttitz, secondly to Christoph Archibald Douglas, currently Gräfin Douglas
- Christian Oetker (born 1948)
- Richard Oetker (born 1951)
On 8 February 1963, Oetker married Marianne (Maja) von Malaisé (born 1934), of nobility. With her he had three children;
- Alfred Oetker (born 1967)
- Carl Ferdinand Oetker (born 1972)
- Julia Oetker (born 1979)
In 2014, the Oetker business empire was valued at $12 billion, and each of his eight children inherited an equal share of 12.5%, or about $1.5 billion.[2] After discovering Oetker's Nazi past, his children hired a provenance researcher to investigate the origins of his art collection. They have begun returning artworks found to be stolen or looted to the heirs of their Jewish owners.[10] In 2019 a painting by Carl Spitzweg was restituted to the heirs of Leo Bendel who had been looted and murdered by Nazis.[11] The painting had been acquired through the Galerie Heinemann in Munich.[12]
See also
edit- Dr. Oetker
- Oetker Collection
- Colnaghi (Oetker's property in 1981)
References
edit- ^ Ignatzi, Christian (22 October 2013). "Another German company reveals its Nazi past". Deutsche Welle. Retrieved 9 September 2018.
- ^ a b de Jong, David (3 February 2014). "Nazi-Forged Fortune Creates Hidden German Billionaires". Bloomberg.com. Retrieved 1 April 2016.
- ^ "German pizza giant Dr Oetker reveals Nazi-era past". BBC News. 18 October 2013. Retrieved 13 May 2017.
- ^ "Dr. Oetker". Holocaust Online. Retrieved 13 May 2017.
- ^ "The Rudolf-August Oetker collection compensates the Emma Budge heirs for a silver cup in the Oetker collection since 2009". Lootedart.com. 19 May 2017. Retrieved 21 May 2017.
In 2011, the representative of the estate of Emma Budge published a search notice for the silver cup on a database for artworks lost in consequence of Nazi persecution.
- ^ Jürgen Finger, Sven Keller, Andreas Wirsching: Dr. Oetker und der Nationalsozialismus. Geschichte eines Familienunternehmens 1933–1945. Verlag C.H.Beck, München 2013, ISBN 978-3-406-64545-7, S. 380
- ^ Jong, David De (15 August 2022). "Bakpoeder, puddingmix en swastika's: 'De familie Oetker was een steunpilaar van de nazisamenleving'". HUMO (in Dutch). Retrieved 28 October 2023.
- ^ "Rudolf August Oetker & family". Forbes. Retrieved 1 April 2016.
- ^ "Die Carlshütte legte den Grundstein - Eisenkunstguss Museum Büdelsdorf". das-eisen.de (in German). Retrieved 10 July 2024.
- ^ Hinckley, Catherine (14 March 2017). "German Art Collectors Face a Painful Past: Do I Own Nazi Loot?". The New York Times. Retrieved 21 May 2017.
- ^ "Kunstsammlung Rudolf-August Oetker gibt Gemälde von Carl Spitzweg an die Nachkommen des jüdischen Sammlers Leo Bendel zurück" (PDF).
- ^ K.d.ö.R, Zentralrat der Juden in Deutschland (20 November 2019). "Dr. Oetker gibt Bild an jüdische Eigentümer zurück". Jüdische Allgemeine (in German). Retrieved 3 April 2021.
Sources
edit- Jungbluth, Rüdiger (2004). Die Oetkers (in German). Campus Verlag. ISBN 978-3-593-37396-6.
- Gotta, Frank (1981). Die deutsche Wirtschaftsprominenz 1981 von A-Z: Lexikon der 200 bedeutendsten zeitgenössischen Persönlichkeiten aus der Wirtschaft (in German). WEKA-Verlag. ISBN 978-3-8111-3046-3.
External links
edit- "Forbes World's Richest People". Forbes. Archived from the original on 13 March 2005.
- "Is Dr Oetker really sincere about facing up to its Nazi past?". TVinemedia. 18 January 2014.
- Hinckley, Catherine. "Dr Oetker returns Van Dyck portrait looted by Göring". The Art Newspaper. Archived from the original on 2 February 2017. Retrieved 10 May 2017.