What is so Special about Immigrant Entrepreneurship? Theories and Question for the German-American Business Biography, 1720 to the Present

Referent/in: Hartmut Berghoff, Washington

Abstract

This paper will first take a look at theoretical models of immigrant entrepreneurship and the results of some of the most important empirical research so far. It will ask for sources of comparative advantages and disadvantages, skill and knowledge transfer, and socio-cultural networks and for processes of assimilation. In its second part, the paper will introduce a new research initiative of the German Historical Institute in Washington D.C., which will focus on the history of German immigrant entrepreneurs in the United States from 1720 to the present time. This major research initiative addresses two central themes in the history of the United States, immigration and entrepreneurship. The topics are closely interrelated, since the U.S. developed a strong culture of entrepreneurship as it became the quintessential receiving country in the nineteenth century. One aim of the project is to reappraise the Economist's statement that "no other country refreshes itself in quite the same way by continuous waves of immigration." The project will also challenge sociological studies on the composition of the American business elite, which claim that it was "disproportionally derived from Protestant, Anglo-Saxon, native-born, well-to-do families." This thesis of a relatively homogeneous, socially exclusive group must certainly be reviewed. The project aims at new empirical data as well as at a contribution to the discussion on the nature of entrepreneurship.

The German Triangle. Entrepreneurial Networks in 19th Century Midwestern United States

Referent/in: Giles Hoyt, Indianapolis

Abstract

The geographic area of interest in this presentation is the Mid West, primarily the Midwestern core, Indiana, Illinois and Ohio, including the major cities Indianapolis, Chicago and Cincinnati. This concentration is by necessity given the expanse of the area and the dearth of research Germans of the first and second generations found open economic markets in the Midwest. Germans arrived in large numbers just when the Northwest frontier was opening for economic development. Entrepreneurs arrived at all times, although most commonly came in the 1840’s and 50’s, somewhat towards the end of early economic development. Earlier immigrants tended to be farmers, craftspeople and the like. We are using the word networks and networking very judiciously in this presentation. The word “networking” was not used to mean a group of linked people until after WWII. Still, since we are looking retrospectively from our time, the word is useful to understand that linking of individuals and groups did indeed take place, which, of course, is a necessary requirement for business. We will see at various levels of economic activity a variety of alliances, partnerships and mergers, all terms au courant with 19th-century business. By examining a number of such phenomena, we can observe considerable diversity in the networks formed. This includes shopkeepers as well as magnates with considerable capital at their disposal. Primary sources provide insight in how the networks were formed. Examples include letters from the Gutknecht-Feil family of entrepreneurial small business people, documents and contemporary articles about the Vonnegut hardware dynasty and its business and familial relationships with the large Lieber brewing and Schnull wholesale businesses; all from Indianapolis. But very instructive is the development of alliances and partnerships with Yankee and other ethnic partners. Essentially business followed capital in the end analysis, not ethnic lines. Business was conducted in the German language, and German-language newspapers, one of our primary sources, show that to be the case. Nonetheless, German-American businesses, except on a very micro scale, had an American orientation and interest in being part of the general economy. At a certain level there is only American business.

Unexceptional Women. Female Immigrant Entrepreneurs in Mid-Nineteenth Century Albany, New York

Referent/in: Susan Ingall Lewis, New York

Abstract

“She is the pioneer of her own fortune & is a hardworkg woman.” So the reporters for R.G. Dun & Co. (an early credit rating agency) of Louisville, Kentucky wrote in 1875 of retail fancy goods dealer Dora Schultz. Born in Bavaria c. 1840, Schultz was also described as “a woman of und[ou]bted energy,” and a “litigatious” proprietor who kept a stock of “very expensive and costly laces” worth $20,000 (approximately $2,000,000 in today’s dollars). Because the history of mid-nineteenth-century women in the United States has been dominated by the image of the domestic sphere, we might be tempted to see Dora Schultz as exceptional, an assertive woman who was “before her time.” Yet Schultz actually represents tens of thousands of nineteenth-century female proprietors operating small businesses in American cities—many of whom were immigrants, and many of these of German birth or ancestry. Building on my previous intensive analysis of businesswomen in Albany, New York, this paper will highlight the contributions of German-American businesswomen from communities across the United States through a selection of representative stories. In addition, I will present a preliminary analysis of the trades in which German immigrant women engaged, the size and longevity of their enterprises, their average age and marital status, and their regions of origin in Germany, as well as their family and household structures. By exploring both the entrepreneurial opportunities and limitations for nineteenth-century German-American women, this paper will reveal female proprietors as an important part of the German immigrant business community.

Creating Hollywood’s Dream World. The Contribution of Carl Laemmle

Referent/in: Cristina Stanca Mustea, Heidelberg

Abstract

Considered a “pioneer among pioneers and the first independent producer of the motion-picture business” (The Los Angeles Times, September 25, 1939, p. 1) Carl Laemmle left an important mark in the history of film industry. He was more than an initiator and a road opener for the film industry: he was a believer in the promises of the American Dream of freedom and success. Born in 1867 in Laupheim, a small village in South-West Germany, Carl Laemmle, the son of a poor Jewish farmer, immigrated to the United States in 1884, at the age of 17. He spent most of his first years in odd jobs, trying to integrate in the new environment and learn English. He was a clerk, a pharmacist’s helper and a farmer in the Mid-West. Eventually he moved to Oshkosh, to work in a retailer firm. For twenty years, he was nothing more than a usual German immigrant facing the challenges of acculturation in the United States. But in 1906, Carl Laemmle gave up the retail to enter the booming world of nickelodeons and the magic of film business. This decision was to influence the development of the American film industry like nothing before it. The opening of Universal Pictures in Hollywood, on March 15, 1915, transformed the German immigrant of Jewish origin into America’s biggest film producer. Laemmle was a man of many “firsts” as he inaugurated innovative production techniques, such as the star system, built the first major film studio in Hollywood, a city dedicated entirely to film production, invested for the first time a million of dollars into a movie and gave the chance to women directors to take charge of their productions. Moreover, Laemmle maintained close connections to Germany and often acted as a transatlantic mediator between Germany and the United States. He supported the German team for the Olympic Games in Los Angeles in 1932, promoted German writers in the United States and acted as an ambassador for the German cause after the end of WWI. Starting with 1934, Laemmle began an active campaign against the prosecution of the German-Jews and used all his influence to gather support for his cause. Until 1939, he succeeded in paying affidavits for over 300 Germans of Jewish origin, saving their lives in this way. In Laemmle’s interpretation, Hollywood was a representation of the American Dream, but one that he lived on two continents he considered home.

Shaping Modern California. The Case of the Spreckels Family

Referent/in: Uwe Spiekermann, Washington

Abstract

Claus Spreckels (1828-1908) and his sons John D. (1853-1296), Adolph (1857-1924), Claus A. (1858-1946), and Rudolph (1872-1958) formed the most successful German-American immigrant entrepreneur family of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. Among German entrepreneurs, only Krupp had a higher fortune. The career of the “money-making genius”, Claus Spreckels, consisted of building and breaking monopolies in sugar, transport, gas and electricity, real estate and newspapers, banks, and breweries in the American West. From the beginning, his sons supported their father to create his western economic empire, although, since the early 1890s, they made their own experiences and fortunes. Rudolph became a dominant figure in California’s banking and infrastructure branches; Adolph sponsored, after a successful career in business, the arts. Claus A. established his own sugar plants on the US-East coast, while John D. is well known as a dominant figure in developing southern California, first of all San Diego, for real estate business and tourism. The paper will use a biographical approach to discuss central questions of American immigrant entrepreneurship. It will discuss, first, the family and ethnic background of business: What were the reasons for migration, the social origins and particular skills? What kind of ethnic and religious identities shaped entrepreneurship? Second, the paper will analyze the business development of the Spreckels family’s widespread investments. What were the entrepreneurial sources of their success? Did ethnic networks help to succeed? What kind of business strategies were used and developed? How did they handle the geographical, political, and social peculiarities of his time? Third, the relevance of immigrant entrepreneurship will be discussed. How and to what extent did the Spreckels become American entrepreneurs? Were the ties to their old Fatherland maintained, and were they relevant for their entrepreneurial success? What were the comparative advantages of an immigrant based in two different cultures? Although unique in their success, the career of the Spreckels family is, in many respects, typical for the formation of a new class of American economic elites – and a new kind of nation, based on the skills and virtues of immigrants from all over the world.