Bad Nauheim
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Bad Nauheim () is a town in the
Wetteraukreis The Wetteraukreis is a ''Kreis'' (district) in the middle of Hesse, Germany. Neighbouring districts are Landkreis Gießen, Vogelsbergkreis, Main-Kinzig-Kreis, district-free Stadt Frankfurt, Hochtaunuskreis and Lahn-Dill-Kreis. History The dis ...
district of
Hesse Hesse or Hessen ( ), officially the State of Hesse (), is a States of Germany, state in Germany. Its capital city is Wiesbaden, and the largest urban area is Frankfurt, which is also the country's principal financial centre. Two other major hist ...
state of
Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...
. As of 2020, Bad Nauheim has a population of 32,493. The town is approximately north of
Frankfurt am Main Frankfurt am Main () is the most populous city in the States of Germany, German state of Hesse. Its 773,068 inhabitants as of 2022 make it the List of cities in Germany by population, fifth-most populous city in Germany. Located in the forela ...
, on the east edge of the
Taunus The Taunus () is a mountain range in Hesse and Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany, located north west of Frankfurt and north of Wiesbaden. The tallest peak in the range is '' Großer Feldberg'' at 878 m; other notable peaks are '' Kleiner Feldberg' ...
mountain range. It is a world-famous resort, noted for its salt springs, which are used to treat heart and nerve diseases. A
Nauheim Nauheim is a municipality in Groß-Gerau (district), Groß-Gerau district in Hesse, Germany. It is located southwest of Frankfurt am Main and is part of the metropolitan region of Frankfurt. It lies in the Hessian Ried. Geography Location Na ...
(or "effervescent") bath, named after Bad Nauheim, p.797 is a type of spa bath through which carbon dioxide is bubbled. Full text at Internet Archive (archive.org) This bath was one of several types of
hydrotherapy Hydrotherapy, formerly called hydropathy and also called water cure, is a branch of alternative medicine (particularly naturopathy), occupational therapy, and Physical therapy, physiotherapy, that involves the use of water for pain relief and ...
used at the Battle Creek SanitariumKellogg, J.H. (1908) pp.79,81,83,170,175,187 and it was also used at the Maurice Bathhouse in Bathhouse Row in the early 1900s during the heyday of hydrotherapy. The Konitzky Foundation, a charitable foundation and hospital for those without economic means, was founded in 1896 and its building occupies a central place next to the Kurpark.


History

Before
the Holocaust The Holocaust (), known in Hebrew language, Hebrew as the (), was the genocide of History of the Jews in Europe, European Jews during World War II. From 1941 to 1945, Nazi Germany and Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy ...
, there had been an on-and-off Jewish presence in Bad Nauheim since around 1303. At that time, nearly 400 Jews lived in the town, making up nearly 3% of the population. On
Kristallnacht ( ) or the Night of Broken Glass, also called the November pogrom(s) (, ), was a pogrom against Jews carried out by the Nazi Party's (SA) and (SS) paramilitary forces along with some participation from the Hitler Youth and German civilia ...
, the schoolhouse was desecrated and ransacked as well as Jewish stores, businesses and the synagogue. Many Jews were taken that night to concentration camps. Some were let out. Of those let out, many were rearrested. By the end of the Holocaust, there were just three Jews remaining in Bad Nauheim. For the most part, those who were not murdered had left the country. The Grand Hotel in Bad Nauheim was also the location of the Gestapo-led internment of around 115 Americans who were working in the U.S. Embassy as well as American journalists in Berlin in December 1941. During their five-month internment at the Grand Hotel, they published the ''Bad Nauheim Pudding'', a locally created newspaper, until it was censored by the Germans. They also formed what they called Badheim University, which allowed the internees education in areas such as languages, phonetics, bible study, and travelogs. The group would leave Bad Nauheim on 12 May 1942 after their five-month internment in Jeschke's Grand Hotel. During
World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...
,
Adolf Hitler Adolf Hitler (20 April 1889 – 30 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was the dictator of Nazi Germany from 1933 until Death of Adolf Hitler, his suicide in 1945. Adolf Hitler's rise to power, He rose to power as the lea ...
had a command complex in nearby Langenhain-Ziegenberg called Adlerhorst, "the Eagle's Nest" (not to be confused with Kehlsteinhaus of Obersalzberg, which was never referred to as "the Eagle's Nest" by the Nazis). On 29 March 1945 Bad Nauheim was occupied by troops from the US Third Army. It was occupied by troops of the Fifteenth United States Army, which was a small group tasked with gathering historical information of Allied operations and documenting tactical methods of war from the Allied troops. It was used as a residential area for American occupation forces after
World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...
. Despite its proximity to Frankfurt am Main and Hitler's command complex, Bad Nauheim was totally spared from Allied bombing. American occupants from that time were told that President Roosevelt had loved the town so much from his days there that he ordered it spared.
Elvis Presley Elvis Aaron Presley (January 8, 1935 – August 16, 1977) was an American singer and actor. Referred to as the "King of Rock and Roll", he is regarded as Cultural impact of Elvis Presley, one of the most significant cultural figures of the ...
lived in Bad Nauheim from 1958 to 1960 while serving in the U.S. Army. At the time, he was assigned to the 1st Medium Tank Battalion, 32d Armor, 3d Armored Division, at Ray Barracks near Friedberg. Since 2002, Bad Nauheim has hosted an annual Elvis festival. Other famous people who have stayed in the town include Jamsetji Tata, founder of the
Tata Group The Tata Group () is an Indian multinational conglomerate group of companies headquartered in Mumbai. Established in 1868, it is India's largest business conglomerate, with products and services in over 160 countries, and operations in 100 c ...
conglomerate company (he died in Bad Nauheim on 19 May 1904 at the age of 82), Irish novelist and Catholic priest Patrick Sheehan (who holidayed at the Hotel Augusta Victoria in Bad Nauheim from 6–23 September 1904),
Franklin D. Roosevelt Franklin Delano Roosevelt (January 30, 1882April 12, 1945), also known as FDR, was the 32nd president of the United States, serving from 1933 until his death in 1945. He is the longest-serving U.S. president, and the only one to have served ...
(as a boy, FDR had been taken for several extended visits to Bad Nauheim where his father underwent a water cure for his heart condition), the Saudi Arabian football team during the
2006 FIFA World Cup The 2006 FIFA World Cup was the 18th FIFA World Cup, the quadrennial international Association football, football world championship tournament. It was held from 9 June to 9 July 2006 in Germany, which had won the right to FIFA World Cup hosts ...
, George S. Patton (who celebrated his sixtieth birthday in the grand ballroom of the Grand Hotel), and
Albert Kesselring Albert Kesselring (30 November 1885 – 16 July 1960) was a German military officer and convicted war crime, war criminal who served in the ''Luftwaffe'' during World War II. In a career which spanned both world wars, Kesselring reached the ra ...
, a Nazi general who died there in 1960.


Churches

* Dankeskirche, Protestant church near the spa facilities, completed in 1906


Education

* Freie Waldorfschule Wetterau * Ernst-Ludwig-Schule (Gymnasium) * St. Lioba Gymnasium (Gymnasium) * Stadtschule an der Wilhelmskirche (Grund- und Hauptschule) * Stadtschule Am Solgraben (Haupt- und Realschule)


Mayors

* 1945–1948: Adolf Bräutigam (SPD) * 1948–1954: Krafft-Helmut Voss (independent) * 1954–1960: Fritz Geißler (FDP) * 1960–1981: Herbert Schäfer (SPD) * 1981–1993: Bernd Rohde (CDU) * 1993–1999: Peter Keller (SPD) * 2000–2005: Bernd Rohde (CDU) * 2005–2011: Bernd Witzel (UWG) * 2011–2017: Armin Häuser (CDU) * since September 2017: Klaus Kreß (independent)


Popular culture

The novel ''
The Good Soldier ''The Good Soldier: A Tale of Passion'' is a 1915 novel by the British writer Ford Madox Ford. It is set just before World War I, and chronicles the tragedy of Edward Ashburnham and his seemingly perfect marriage, along with that of his two A ...
'' by
Ford Madox Ford Ford Madox Ford (né Joseph Leopold Ford Hermann Madox Hueffer ( ); 17 December 1873 – 26 June 1939) was an English novelist, poet, critic and editor whose journals ''The English Review'' and ''The Transatlantic Review (1924), The Transatlant ...
(published 1915) is set in part at Bad Nauheim. The internment of American journalists at the Grand Hotel in 1942 is depicted in a section of the novel ''The War Begins in Paris'' (published in 2023).


Twin towns – sister cities

Bad Nauheim is twinned with: * Bad Langensalza, Germany *
Buxton Buxton is a spa town in the High Peak, Derbyshire, Borough of High Peak, Derbyshire, in the East Midlands region of England. It is England's highest market town, sited at some above sea level.Alston, Cumbria also claims this, but lacks a regu ...
, England, United Kingdom * Chaumont, France * Oostkamp, Belgium


The ''Sprudelhof''

The Sprudelhof is recognized as the largest center of ''
Jugendstil (; "Youth Style") was an artistic movement, particularly in the decorative arts, that was influential primarily in Germany, Austria and elsewhere in Europe to a lesser extent from about 1895 until about 1910. It was the German and Austrian cou ...
'' within Germany. File:Bad Nauheim 2010 20597.jpg, Bathhouse No. 4 File:Sprudelhof 32.jpg,
Centaur A centaur ( ; ; ), occasionally hippocentaur, also called Ixionidae (), is a creature from Greek mythology with the upper body of a human and the lower body and legs of a horse that was said to live in the mountains of Thessaly. In one version o ...
File:Badehaus 7 Schmuckhof Brunnen Heinrich Jobst.jpg, Courtyard File:Bad Nauheim 2010 20598.JPG, Fountain File:Badehaus 3 Ludwigsbrunnen Brunnenfigur Natur Heinrich Jobst.jpg,
Mermaid In folklore, a mermaid is an aquatic creature with the head and upper body of a female human and the tail of a fish. Mermaids appear in the folklore of many cultures worldwide, including Europe, Latin America, Asia, and Africa. Mermaids are ...
File:Badehaus 7 Wartesaal Tritonenkind Karl Huber.jpg, Triton File:Bad nauheim p 013.jpg, Bathhouse No. 5


Notable residents

* Julian Dudda (born 1993), professional football player. * Holger Geschwindner (born 1945), basketball player, long-time coach and mentor of
Dirk Nowitzki Dirk Werner Nowitzki (; born June 19, 1978) is a German former professional basketball player who is a special advisor for the Dallas Mavericks of the National Basketball Association (NBA). Listed at , he is widely regarded as one of the great ...
. * Rainer Philipp (born 1950), ice hockey player. * Klaus Hentschel (born 1961), physicist and historian of science. * Caroline Link (born 1964), director, won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film and ''
Deutscher Filmpreis The German Film Award (), also known as Lola after its prize statuette, is the national film award of Germany. It is presented at an annual ceremony honouring cinematic achievements in the Cinema of Germany, German film industry. Besides being ...
'' for '' Nowhere in Africa'' (2001). *
Elvis Presley Elvis Aaron Presley (January 8, 1935 – August 16, 1977) was an American singer and actor. Referred to as the "King of Rock and Roll", he is regarded as Cultural impact of Elvis Presley, one of the most significant cultural figures of the ...
(1935–1977), American singer and actor, lived at Goethestrasse 14 from 1958 to 1960 while stationed at Ray Barracks near Friedberg. * George S. Patton (1885–1945), U.S. Army general, commanded the Fifteenth Army at Bad Nauheim from October 1945 until his death in December. * Jessica Wahls (born 1977), singer, former member of the
girl group A girl group is a music act featuring two or more women in music, female singers who generally vocal harmony, harmonize together. The term "girl group" is also used in a narrower sense in the United States to denote the wave of American female p ...
No Angels No Angels are an all-female Pop music, pop group from Germany, formed in 2000. Originally a quintet, consisting of band members Nadja Benaissa, Ludmilla Diakovska, Lucy Diakovska, Sandy Mölling, Vanessa Petruo, and Jessica Wahls, they originat ...
. * Sina-Valeska Jung (born 1979), actress. * Jasmin Moghbeli (born 1983), American astronaut, born in Bad Nauheim.


See also

* 811 Nauheima


References


External links

* {{Authority control 9th-century establishments in East Francia Holocaust locations in Germany Populated places established in the 9th century Spa towns in Germany Wetteraukreis