Alfred krupp biography

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Before him are Patrick Geddes, Grand Duchess Vera Konstantinovna of Russia, Zhang Xun, Konstantin Jireček, Takahashi Korekiyo, and Aletta Jacobs. His father, Friedrich Krupp (1787 - 1826), had purchased a small forge in that town about 1810, and devoted himself to the problem of manufacturing cast steel; but though that product was put on the market by him in 1815, it commanded but little sale, and the firm was far from prosperous.

Friedrich Alfred Krupp significantly expanded the family holdings, acquiring shipyards in Kiel on the Baltic Sea and a steelworks in Magdeburg. Friedrich greatly expanded Krupp and acquired the Germaniawerft in 1896 which gave him control of warship manufacturing in Germany. It was incidents of this kind, together with his exploitation of slave labour, that put Alfried in the prisoners’ dock at the Nürnberg war-crimes trials after the war.

At first the victorious Allies, under the impression that Gustav had been in charge throughout the war, had indicted him.

His father, Alfred Krupp, born in 1812 and died in 1887, transformed the modest family enterprise into the largest steel company in Germany. Health and retirement benefits were also provided for the workforce, but they were a means of enforcing industrial discipline, as well as means of philanthropy. Essen (the city where he based) became a large company town and Krupp became a de facto state within a state, with "Kruppianer" as loyal to the company and the Krupp family as to the nation and the Hohenzollern family.

By the early 1960s he was worth more than a billion dollars.

Alfried Krupp’s only son, Arndt, renounced his succession rights and his Krupp name.

When the building of main line railways was proposed in Germany he adapted his works to roll rails and to build locomotives, rolling stock and structural ironwork. Alfried Krupp (1907-67) was charged but not tried with war crimes for his use of slave labour during the Third Reich, but regained control of the company in 1953.

After many subsequent changes Friedrich Krupp AG Hoesch-Krupp merged in 1999 to form ThyssenKrupp AG, which remains a powerful force in the economy of the Ruhrgebiet.