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Rudolf August Oetker

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Rudolf August Oetker
Oetker in 1966
Born(1916-09-20)20 September 1916
Bielefeld, German Empire
Died16 January 2007(2007-01-16) (aged 90)
Hamburg, Germany
Occupation(s)Owner and CEO of Oetker-Gruppe
Political partyNational Socialist German Workers' Party (1930s–1945)
ChildrenRichard Oetker
RelativesAugust Oetker (grandfather)
Richard Kaselowsky (stepfather)

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]

Early life and education[edit]

Oetker 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[edit]

After the war, Oetker was interned in the Staumühle internment camp near Paderborn. When his SS blood group tattoo was discovered under his left armpit, which identified him as a member of the SS, he was brutally beaten by the guards. For years after the war, Oetker would need a cane to walk. He was released from custody 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[edit]

In 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 daugther;

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]

References[edit]

  1. ^ Ignatzi, Christian (22 October 2013). "Another German company reveals its Nazi past". Deutsche Welle. Retrieved 9 September 2018.
  2. ^ a b de Jong, David (3 February 2014). "Nazi-Forged Fortune Creates Hidden German Billionaires". Bloomberg.com. Retrieved 1 April 2016.
  3. ^ "German pizza giant Dr Oetker reveals Nazi-era past". BBC News. 18 October 2013. Retrieved 13 May 2017.
  4. ^ "Dr. Oetker". Holocaust Online. Retrieved 13 May 2017.
  5. ^ "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.
  6. ^ 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
  7. ^ 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.
  8. ^ "Rudolf August Oetker & family". Forbes. Retrieved 1 April 2016.
  9. ^ "Die Carlshütte legte den Grundstein - Eisenkunstguss Museum Büdelsdorf". das-eisen.de (in German). Retrieved 10 July 2024.
  10. ^ 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.
  11. ^ "Kunstsammlung Rudolf-August Oetker gibt Gemälde von Carl Spitzweg an die Nachkommen des jüdischen Sammlers Leo Bendel zurück" (PDF).
  12. ^ 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]

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