2023-12-29 12:11:40
Maps around Meerholz and Hailer, two districts of Gelnhausen, show around a dozen symbols for mining. This is also necessary, as we should not forget how dominant the extraction of raw and building materials was until just a few decades ago. While sandstone mining predominated along the entire edge of the Spessart, geological peculiarities in the north allowed lime and clay to be mined. All of the mines have almost completely disappeared, as have their processing facilities that previously dominated the Kinzig Valley, the Meerholz brickworks and the Hailer clay works.
Structural change primarily benefits nature. Even in areas without explicit protection, only cliff edges or deep faults reveal where the slopes were once torn open. Since control interventions were largely avoided, the vegetation overgrew everything in an astonishingly short time. Only a few paths are kept clear between the jungle-like intertwined trees and bushes.
Branch line of the Counts of Ysenburg-Büdingen
The mining of clay and lime did not begin on an industrial scale until the 19th century. Previously, since the late Middle Ages, the earth was dug for silver and ores, as in the nearby Biebertal, although “the mine could not bear the cost”.
It was only in 1554 when a branch of the Counts of Ysenburg-Büdingen came into possession of the choir women’s monastery of St. Mary near “Misoldis”, i.e. Meerholz, which was first mentioned 850 years ago, that mining was tackled professionally with outside specialists. After all, they wanted to strike their own coins. But until well into the 18th century, all long-term efforts failed.
The pecuniary wealth had to be sufficient to upgrade the small county with a residence in keeping with its status. The basic structure and masonry of the monastery provided the cost-effective foundation. The current appearance and the park with its mighty sequoia tree date primarily from the early 20th century. First renovated on the occasion of the wedding of a Ysenburg countess in 1906 – for which even Kaiser Wilhelm II came – and then changed in the 1920s in a historicist, neo-Gothic style.
After Count Gustav, who died childless in 1929, the city of Frankfurt acquired the property in 1942 for a country school home, but after the end of the war leased it to the Protestant Inner Mission for a nursing home and other social facilities that still exist today. The outdoor area and parts of the park are freely accessible.
Directions
Haller and Meerholz have a shared train station in Hailer; There is also plenty of parking space all around. Before the station turn left, then right into Heegstrasse and then left into Heylstrasse. With its right-hand curve you unexpectedly find yourself transported back in time. Where private homes once dominated, the picture is now dominated by densely packed half-timbered houses of various sizes and uses.
The most obvious are the guild and inn “Saust” from 1543 and the former “Mayor’s Office”, as it is written on the front, or the blacksmith shop. It has been restored to its functionality, just like the bakery in front of the western upper gate. Behind it, keep left onto the wide Gelnhäuser Straße, only to leave it again after 150 meters on the right towards Bodenbenderstraße. It leads past the old cemetery and ends at Jahnstrasse. Its continuation through Goldhohlstrasse merges seamlessly into open space.
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