Bad Laasphe () is a town in

North Rhine-Westphalia North Rhine-Westphalia or North-Rhine/Westphalia, commonly shortened to NRW, is a States of Germany, state () in Old states of Germany, Western Germany. With more than 18 million inhabitants, it is the List of German states by population, most ...

, Germany, in the

Siegen-Wittgenstein Siegen-Wittgenstein is a Kreis (district) in the southeast of North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. Neighboring districts are Olpe (district), Olpe, Hochsauerlandkreis, Waldeck-Frankenberg, Marburg-Biedenkopf, Lahn-Dill, Westerwaldkreis, and Altenkirche ...

district.

Geography

Location

The town of Bad Laasphe lies in the upper

Lahn The Lahn () is a , right (or eastern) tributary of the Rhine in Germany. Its course passes through the States of Germany, federal states of North Rhine-Westphalia (23.0 km), Hesse (165.6 km), and Rhineland-Palatinate (57.0 km). ...

Valley, near the stately home of Wittgenstein Castle (de) (nowadays a

boarding school A boarding school is a school where pupils live within premises while being given formal instruction. The word "boarding" is used in the sense of "room and board", i.e. lodging and meals. They have existed for many centuries, and now extend acr ...

) in the former Wittgenstein district. The municipal area is located south of the main crest of the

Rothaargebirge The Rothaar Mountains (, , also ''Rotlagergebirge''), or Rothaar, is a low mountain range reaching heights of up to 843.1 m in North Rhine-Westphalia and Hesse, Germany. It is believed that its name must once have been ''Rod-Hard-Gebirge'', ...

, and borders in the north on the towns of

Bad Berleburg Bad Berleburg (, earlier also Berleburg) is a town, in the district of Siegen-Wittgenstein, in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is one of Germany's largest towns by land area. It is located approximately northeast of Siegen and northwest of ...

and

Erndtebrück Erndtebrück is a municipality in the Siegen-Wittgenstein district, in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. Geography Location Erndtebrück situated on the river Eder in the Rothaargebirge, approx. 20 km northeast of Siegen. Neighbouring com ...

, in the east on the town of

Biedenkopf Biedenkopf () is a spa town in western Hesse, Germany with a population of 13,491 (2020). Geography Location The town of Biedenkopf lies in the west of Marburg-Biedenkopf district. Ringed by mountains reaching up to above sea level – the ...

Hessen Hesse or Hessen ( ), officially the State of Hesse (), is a 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 historic cities are Da ...

, in the southeast on

Breidenbach Breidenbach is a municipality in the west of Marburg-Biedenkopf district in 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 Fra ...

, in the south on

Dietzhölztal The municipality of Dietzhölztal is the northernmost municipality in the Lahn-Dill-Kreis in Hesse, Germany. Geography The community is located in a valley of the same name, only a few kilometres east of the border with North Rhine-Westphalia. Ri ...

and in the west on the town of

Netphen Netphen () is a town in the Siegen-Wittgenstein district, in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It lies on the river Sieg, roughly 7 km northeast of Siegen. Geography Location Netphen lies on the Rothaargebirge's southern slope and forms the ...

. Bad Laasphe lies about 30 km east of

Siegen Siegen () is a List of cities and towns in Germany, city in Germany, in the south Westphalian part of North Rhine-Westphalia. It is located in the district of Siegen-Wittgenstein in the Arnsberg (region), Arnsberg region. The university town (n ...

and 25 km northwest of

Marburg Marburg (; ) is a college town, university town in the States of Germany, German federal state () of Hesse, capital of the Marburg-Biedenkopf Districts of Germany, district (). The town area spreads along the valley of the river Lahn and has ...

. The highest elevation in the municipal area rises to 694 m. It lies southwest of the main town at the outlying centre of Heiligenborn.

Constituent communities

Each one of the following centres is part of the town of Bad Laasphe:

History

In 1888, the town of Laasphe lay in the

Prussia Prussia (; ; Old Prussian: ''Prūsija'') was a Germans, German state centred on the North European Plain that originated from the 1525 secularization of the Prussia (region), Prussian part of the State of the Teutonic Order. For centuries, ...

n administrative region of

Arnsberg Arnsberg (; ) is a town in the Hochsauerland county, in the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia. It is the location of the Regierungsbezirk Arnsberg (region), Arnsberg administration and one of the three local administration offices of the Ho ...

in Wittgenstein district and was connected to the Kreuzthal-Marburg line of the Prussian State

Railway Rail transport (also known as train transport) is a means of transport using wheeled vehicles running in railway track, tracks, which usually consist of two parallel steel railway track, rails. Rail transport is one of the two primary means of ...

(''Preußische Staatsbahn''). In 1888 Laasphe had a junior teachers' college, a local

court A court is an institution, often a government entity, with the authority to adjudicate legal disputes between Party (law), parties and Administration of justice, administer justice in Civil law (common law), civil, Criminal law, criminal, an ...

and

knitwear Knitted fabric is a textile that results from knitting, the process of inter-looping of yarns or inter-meshing of loops. Its properties are distinct from woven fabric in that it is more flexible and can be more readily constructed into smaller ...

and

hosiery Hosiery, (, ) also referred to as legwear, describes garments worn directly on the foot, feet and human leg, legs. The term originated as the collective term for products of which a maker or seller is termed a hosier; and those products are also ...

factories. In 1885, Laasphe had 2225 mostly

Evangelical Evangelicalism (), also called evangelical Christianity or evangelical Protestantism, is a worldwide, interdenominational movement within Protestantism, Protestant Christianity that emphasizes evangelism, or the preaching and spreading of th ...

inhabitants. Schloss Wittgenstein owned two

ironworks An ironworks or iron works is an industrial plant where iron is smelted and where heavy iron and steel products are made. The term is both singular and plural, i.e. the singular of ''ironworks'' is ''ironworks''. Ironworks succeeded bloome ...

. (From ''

Meyers Konversations-Lexikon or was a major encyclopedia in the German language that existed in various editions, and by several titles, from 1839 to 1984, when it merged with the . Joseph Meyer (publisher), Joseph Meyer (1796–1856), who had founded the publishing hous ...

'') Since 1960, Laasphe has been a Kneipp spa. On 1 January 1984 the town became a Kneipp curative spa for its mild climate, and since then has been called Bad Laasphe.

Government

The results of the local council elections in May 2014SPD wird stärkste Kraft im Rat von Bad Laasphe
/ref> were:

Coat of arms

Bad Laasphe's civic

coat of arms A coat of arms is a heraldry, heraldic communication design, visual design on an escutcheon (heraldry), escutcheon (i.e., shield), surcoat, or tabard (the last two being outer garments), originating in Europe. The coat of arms on an escutcheon f ...

might heraldically be described thus: In sable a town wall with open gate tower argent flanked by two crenellated towers argent, between which an inescutcheon in argent two pallets sable. A stamping of the town's seal from the 14th century has been preserved, which shows the same composition as the arms shown here. The inescutcheon (smaller shield within the main one) bears the same arms as the town's former overlords, the Counts of Wittgenstein. When the arms were revised in 1908, the town came up with another composition which looked the same, but the inescutcheon, owing to a misunderstanding, was rather different, being quartered with two opposite quarters showing in gules (red) a castle argent (silver), and in the two other quarters the Wittgenstein pallets. The castle charge was a modern addition and related to the Wittgensteins' overlordship in Homburg. The town archive suggested even then that the inescutcheon bear the old Wittgenstein arms as seen in the town's oldest known seal, but no decision was made about it at that time. Only in 1936 did the town finally decide to revert to the composition shown in the old seal. This was confirmed as the town's arms on 10 March 1937.

Twin towns

Tamworth, Staffordshire Tamworth (, ) is a market town and Borough status in the United Kingdom, borough in Staffordshire, England, north-east of Birmingham. The town borders North Warwickshire to the east and south, Lichfield District, Lichfield to the north, south- ...

, England, United Kingdom, since 10 October 1980 *

Châteauneuf-sur-Loire Châteauneuf-sur-Loire () is a commune in the Loiret department in north-central France. Population Twin towns * Amarante, Portugal * Bad Laasphe, Germany See also * Communes of the Loiret department The following is the list of the 3 ...

, France, since 28 September 1991

Notable people

* Ludwig Crocius (1586–1655), preacher, professor at Bremen '' School Illustre '' *

Friedrich Kiel Friedrich Kiel (8 October 182113 September 1885) was a German composer and music educator. Writing of the chamber music of Friedrich Kiel, the scholar and critic Wilhelm Altmann notes that it was Kiel’s extreme modesty which kept him and his ...

, (1821–1885),

composer A composer is a person who writes music. The term is especially used to indicate composers of Western classical music, or those who are composers by occupation. Many composers are, or were, also skilled performers of music. Etymology and def ...

Wilhelm Pauck Wilhelm Pauck (January 31, 1901 - September 3, 1981) was a German-American church historian and historical theologian in the field of Reformation studies whose fifty-year teaching career reached from the University of Chicago and Union Theologica ...

(1901–1981), Protestant church historian * Rudolf Jung (1907–1973), writer and translator * Fritz Heinrich, (1921–1959), German politician (

SPD The Social Democratic Party of Germany ( , SPD ) is a social democratic political party in Germany. It is one of the major parties of contemporary Germany. Saskia Esken has been the party's leader since the 2019 leadership election together wi ...

), Member of the

Bundestag The Bundestag (, "Federal Diet (assembly), Diet") is the lower house of the Germany, German Federalism in Germany, federal parliament. It is the only constitutional body of the federation directly elected by the German people. The Bundestag wa ...

Otto Piene Otto Piene (, 18 April 1928 – 17 July 2014) was a German-American artist specializing in kinetic art, kinetic and technology-based art, often working collaboratively. He lived and worked in Düsseldorf, Germany; Cambridge, Massachusetts; and G ...

, (1928–2014),

painter Painting is a Visual arts, visual art, which is characterized by the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a solid surface (called "matrix" or "Support (art), support"). The medium is commonly applied to the base with ...

and

artist An artist is a person engaged in an activity related to creating art, practicing the arts, or demonstrating the work of art. The most common usage (in both everyday speech and academic discourse) refers to a practitioner in the visual arts o ...

* Fritz Roth, born 1955,

actor An actor (masculine/gender-neutral), or actress (feminine), is a person who portrays a character in a production. The actor performs "in the flesh" in the traditional medium of the theatre or in modern media such as film, radio, and television. ...

and musician

References

External links

Official site

Bad Laasphe in the ''Kulturatlas Westfalen'' (with 360° panoramas)

{{Authority control Towns in North Rhine-Westphalia Siegen-Wittgenstein Spa towns in Germany