29 Facts About Lorenz Adlon

Lorenz Adlon was born in Mainz as Laurenz, the sixth out of nine children of a Catholic shoemaker, Jacob Adlon, and his wife Anna Maria Elisabeth, an accoucheuse.

Lorenz Adlon's grandfather, Andreas Adlon, was a groom from the Spessart region.

Lorenz Adlon was trained as a cabinet maker, finishing an apprenticeship in 1872 at the nationally leading Bembe cabinet-making workshop of Mainz.

Lorenz Adlon married again, to Fanny Claus, a widow from a prosperous Stuttgart family, who died just short time after in 1893, in Berlin.

Lorenz Adlon joined a fellow student, opening a wine store together, for selling what was produced by the many regional vineyards.

Lorenz Adlon got earnestly interested for gastronomy after a trip to France; after returning from the Franco-Prussian War, Adlon so started working as an innkeeper, in 1872.

In 1876, Lorenz Adlon accomplished his first big job in Mainz, catering the crowds during a regional shooting contest.

In 1878, Lorenz Adlon opened the Raimundigarten restaurant, a wooden building, built over an abandoned fortification of Mainz, at its northwest, over the bank of the Rhine.

Lorenz Adlon then started exporting Bohemian Pilsener beer abroad, to both The Netherlands and Belgium.

Late in the 1870s, Lorenz Adlon enthusiastically moved to Berlin, which was so attractive as the magnificent new capital of the German Empire.

Once there, Lorenz Adlon began in the business of selling wines.

Meanwhile, Lorenz Adlon kept managing the catering for international events, in 1881 for the festival of gymnastics of Frankfurt, in 1882 for the Bavarian Trade exhibition, in 1883 for Amsterdam World's Fair.

Subsequently, Lorenz Adlon started acquiring several restaurants, one after the other.

Lorenz Adlon acquired the Mille Colonnes hotel, at the Rembrandtplein in Amsterdam.

Lorenz Adlon then took over Hiller's restaurant at 55 Unter den Linden boulevard.

The place already was leading because of its French dishes, and during Adler's management, it became the most exclusive restaurant in Berlin; Lorenz Adlon then was a recognized socialite.

In 1889 Lorenz Adlon acquired his first hotel, the Mille Colonnes, on the Rembrandtplein in Amsterdam.

In 1899, Lorenz Adlon leased the until then decadent two terraces of the zoo of Mainz.

Shortly after the turn of the century, Lorenz Adlon agreed with the young emperor William II, who disliked his own very traditional town palace, to establish a hotel in the town.

Lorenz Adlon managed the process, acquiring several available properties round the 1 Unter den Linden just besides the Brandenburg Gate, despite the protests of many Berliners.

At the heart of Berlin, the Lorenz Adlon Hotel became the centre of the social life in the city.

However, after the war the supportive German monarchy was deposed, and so the magnificence of the Lorenz Adlon Hotel started to dim.

Lorenz Adlon refused to remove the monarch's bronze bust from the fireplace room when the emperor had already left for Holland and Philipp Scheidemann had proclaimed the republic.

Lorenz Adlon refused driving through the Brandenburg Gate by the central line, which had once been reserved for the German nobility.

Lorenz Adlon had suffered a severe street accident in 1918 and in 1921, at the same place, Lorenz Adlon suffered a second, fatal accident, being hit by a car.

Lorenz Adlon's son Ludwig Anton, born on 3 October 1874, had five children with his first wife Tilly.

Lorenz Adlon was picked up by the Russians for interrogation, and he collapsed on his way home and died.

Louis Lorenz Adlon died in May 1945 in a ditch near Velten.

Hedda Lorenz Adlon lived with her sister in Halensee, died on January 6,1967.