Geschichte des Wohnheims
Seit seiner Eröffnung 1960 hat das Studentenwohnheim Geschwister Scholl e.V. eine reichhaltige Geschichte hinter sich. Nachfolgend berichten wir über die Bauphasen, der Veränderungen rund um Gebäude & Organisation, die Zusammenarbeit mit dem Marchionini-Heim sowie die Geschichte der Heimleitung.
History of our Dorm
Since its opening in 1960, the student dormitory Geschwister Scholl e.V. has had a rich history. In the following we report on the construction phases, the changes around the building & organization, the cooperation with the Marchionini-Heim as well as the history of the dormitory management.
House 1 construction
Already in the founding year of the association, 1956, the collection of donations began. Thousands of „begging letters” were sent to private and business people, accompanied by numerous conversations, at every available opportunity. The prominent names of the patron and the founders of the association, Bavarian Minister President Dr. Wilhelm Hoegner, University Rector Prof. Dr. Alfred Marchionini, Minister of Justice Dr. Fritz Koch and Dr. Hans-Jochen Vogel, were helpful. After only two years, the necessary funds were raised and a plot of land owned by the city of Munich near the Munich universities was found. The city sold it to the association and at the same time granted it a subsidy in the amount of the purchase price. Both of these were mainly thanks to Thomas Wimmer (SPD), the mayor of Munich at the time, who was a staunch supporter of the dormitory from the city’s side. In addition, there were subsidies from the federal and state governments, a loan from the Stadtsparkasse savings bank, and a non-cancelable advance rent payment from the Arbeitsgemeinschaft Sozialdemokratischer Akademiker (Working Group of Social Democratic Academics). In return, the association undertook to rent the Arbeitsgemeinschaft an office on the first floor of approx. 20m² at the usual rent and to grant it the right to use the common rooms. The rights under this contract were transferred to the Social Democratic Academic Association, whose office was housed in the home until 1973.
Als Architekten für den Bau konnten Werner und Grete Wirsing, angesehene Pioniere der Nachkriegsmoderne, gewonnen werden. Nach gründlicher Planung, die am 21. Januar 1958 mit der Fertigstellung der Baupläne abgeschlossen wurde, konnte der Bau begonnen und am 25. März 1959 der Grundstein gelegt werden. Bis zum Jahresende konnte Haus 1 mit 144 Wohnplätzen – davon 64 in Doppelzimmern – fertiggestellt und bezogen werden. Die feierliche Eröffnung fand am 7. Januar 1960 statt. Die Gesamtkosten beliefen sich auf 1,2 Mio. DM. Werner Wirsing war bis zu seinem Lebensende dem Studentenwohnheim und seinem Trägerverein als Mitglied verbunden.
Model of House 1 of the Schollheim after Werner and Grete Wirsing (provided by „Architekturmuseum der TUM”).
oben: Haus 1 kurz nach Fertigstellung 1960. Im Vordergrund ist das Trümmergrundstück zu sehen, auf dem heute Haus 2 steht.
There was special applause at the opening of House 1 when the association’s managing director, Dr. Hans-Jochen Vogel, announced that Arbeiterwohlfahrt had donated a television to the home’s residents. At that time, in 1960, television was just seven years old in post-war Germany and owning a television was not something that could be taken for granted.
House 1 shortly after completion in 1960. In the foreground you can see the rubble plot on which house 2 stands today.
Cooperation between dormitory management and the student’s self-administration
Even before the first students moved into House 1 on January 1, 1960, the association had laid the foundations for extensive self-administration by the dormitory residents through appropriate provisional regulations. They were to be involved in the administration of the dormitory by the association, for example, by selecting the future dormitory residents themselves, by having a say in decisions about the budget and rent increases, and by being able to shape dormitory life on their own responsibility. In the years that followed, this was introduced step by step. Since then, the residents, who are represented by three members on the association’s nine-member board of trustees, have further developed the content and form of their self-administration in consultation with the association.
On the part of the association, cooperation with the student self-administration is largely the responsibility of the dormitory management, i.e. the dormitory director.
Heads of the dormitory
The initial appointment of the dormitory director was questionable, as the intention was to be more than a normal student dormitory, namely a place of political education, education for tolerance, democracy and social commitment. The founders of the association sent out a clear signal by choosing the first female director of the dormitory: they appointed Dr. Helga Grebing (✝ September 25, 2017 in Berlin), a young historian who was little known at the time and who wrote standard works on National Socialism and the German labor movement in the years that followed. From today’s perspective, she was one of the most distinguished historians of the postwar period.
Grebing’s program for the dormitory was a „Studium générale”: students were to debate politics, contemporary history, literature and art. This was encouraged by lectures by prominent personalities such as Dr. Wilhelm Hoegner on „How Germany is governed,” Dr. Alfred Jüttner on „The Sovietization of East Central Europe,” or Inge Scholl, the sister of the murdered, on „the extent to which the ideas of her siblings have been realized today.” Thus it came about that the Süddeutsche Zeitung published an article about the dormitory on March 28, 1961 under the title „The house residents – a family of peoples”.
On May 1, 1962, Grebing was succeeded as director of the home by the mathematician Josef Maisch, who was the first full-time rector of the then newly established Munich College. Until his death on September 25, 1986, he was meritoriously active as part-time director of the home for more than 24 years. This period embodied an entire era of the Schollheim, which was strongly influenced by the political and social changes that had gripped our country since 1968.
Subsequently, the retired educator Karl-Heinz Hammermüller took over the management of the home until he died at the age of 77 on May 4, 2001. A proven sailor on the high seas, he also steered a successful course for the home on land with great circumspection, empathy and in a cooperative spirit.
His successor was the architect Tilmann Breitbach, whose work for the Bavarian State Building Administration ended in spring 2002 when he took early retirement. Like his predecessors, he successfully dedicated himself to the residential home, the construction of house 3 being particularly noteworthy. On behalf of the association, he drafted the first plans of the extension building, after which he accompanied and supervised the construction activities for the association. Due to his age, he retired from the management of the home in 2019.
Since 2019, Alexandra Filser has been the successor to Tilmann Breitbach, who now performs the tasks of administration and home management in personal union. Before additionally taking over the management of the home, she had already been active in the administration of the Schollheim since 2014, as of 2018 as administrative manager. She was trained at the company W. Rohrer & Sohn Treuhandgesellschaft as a businesswoman for property and housing management and is therefore very familiar with rental management.
Head of the dormitory Dr. Helga Grebing
head of the dormitory Josef Maisch
head of the dormitory Karl-Heinz Hammermüller
head of the dormitory Tilmann Breitbach
head of the dormitory Alexandra Filser
House 2 construction
After the completion of House 1, fundraising continued in order to be able to build a second house. Again, within two years, fundraising succeeded in raising the necessary equity to apply for the favorable federal and state funds and to obtain a bank loan. Once again, the city helped by selling the adjacent ruin property to the association and again providing a subsidy in the amount of the purchase price. Werner and Grete Wirsing were able to continue building. By mid-1963, all preparations, including planning, were completed, the building permit was issued, and construction could begin. Difficult building ground (due to deep ruined cellars), the requirement to build garages, the necessary closed connecting passage between the two houses, and general inflation led to unwelcome cost increases. In April 1964, House 2 was ready for occupancy with its 98 single rooms, the connecting corridor and 21 garages. The total cost of construction was DM 1.5 million.
Collaboration with the Marchionini Foundation
Since the fall of 1972, the Geschwister Scholl student dormitory and the marchionini-dormitory have formed an administrative unit. This means that in addition to the Schollheim, the administrative staff and the janitor also look after the Marchionini home at Lerchenauer Straße 41 in Munich.
The basis for this cooperation is the common history and shared spiritual attitude of both dormitories and their sponsors.
Establishment of the Alfred and Karl Marchionini Foundation
As the first chairman of the association, Alfred Marchionini not only played a major role in the founding of the Geschwister Scholl student dormitory, but he and his wife Mathilde also donated their entire fortune for the construction of another student dormitory and for the support of needy students. To this end, the childless Marchionini couple established the Alfred and Karl Marchionini Foundation in their wills. They took care of the construction of the Marchionini student dormitory, which is still in their possession today.
Shortly before her death, Dr. Mathilde Marchionini decreed that her first name be replaced in the foundation’s name by the first name of her father-in-law (Karl). In doing so, she wanted to honor the man from whom her husband derived his ideals. After the First World War, Karl Marchionini was an editor at the Leipziger Volkszeitung, an organ of the Independent Social Democrats (USPD).
Construction of the Marchionini student dormitory
The planning and construction of the Marchionini Student Residence, as with House 1 and House 2 of the Geschwister Scholl Student Residence, were essentially the result of the voluntary commitment of Robert Jenisch. He was the managing director of the Schollheim for many years. The architect of the Marchionini home was equally Werner Wirsing.
Das Gebäude des Marchionini-Studentenwohnheims
The Marchionini home was completed in time for the 1972 Olympics and housed referees during the games. Immediately after the Games, the students moved in.
Due to an agreed administrative alliance, the Marchionini-Heim was co-managed from the beginning by the Schollheim. The responsibilities and decision-making powers of the Board of Directors and the Managing Director of the Alfred and Karl Marchionini Foundation remain unaffected.
The Marchionini dormitory building
Repairs and conversions
No house in the world remains new and as intact as the day it is completed. From the outside, wind and weather, heat, cold, rain, ice and snow gnaw away at it; from the inside, residents and visitors constantly wear it down. That’s why the dormitory has had to undergo a number of renovations since it was built.
Renovations house 1
Among other things, the flat roofs were renovated, on which the tarboards had to be renewed again and again until they could be replaced by durable aluminum sheeting.
Again and again, windows, facades, installations and floors had to be replaced and the walls of the rooms had to be freshly painted.
In House 1, there were already major renovations in the 1980s: On the one hand, the kitchen and sanitary areas were expanded to include and change the use of eight single rooms, and on the other hand, the home manager’s and tutors’ apartment on the first floor was converted into a new residential group with eight single rooms to compensate for the loss of rooms mentioned above.
Roof construction and extension for both houses
However, the biggest building project was experienced (and endured) by the home’s residents from June 1998 to July 1999, when the flat roofs were replaced by hipped roofs and expanded into three residential groups with a total of 22 single rooms. In turn, the remaining 24 double rooms could finally be converted into single rooms. The total number of residential places thus decreased by only two units to 232 rooms.
All rooms in House 1 and House 2 received new washbasins and finally also hot water. The electrical installation had to be completely renewed and reinforced. At the same time, all rooms received telephone lines, TV/audio cable connections and connections to the new EDP house network (Schollnet). This is connected to the Leibniz Computer Center (LRZ) of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences and Humanities via a high-performance dedicated line and offers every resident free access to the Internet.
Almost all windows of both houses were renewed and the facade freshly painted. The two outdated central heating systems were replaced by more modern, electronically controlled systems and each was supplemented by a solar collector system with a total collector area of around 100m².
These construction measures, which cost a total of almost DM 5 million, were only possible with massive state subsidies and generous contributions from private sources. Only a loan of 550,000 DM had to be taken out, so that the rents had to be raised only slightly.
House 1 in the initial state with flat roof
House 1 and 2 with roof extensions, before the construction of house 3
House 3 construction
Since 2013, plans have been underway to create additional dormitory places in the immediate vicinity of Munich’s universities and colleges. These plans can again be traced back to the association’s long-time managing director Robert Jenisch.
Third phase of construction of the Schollheim
Due to the lack of vacant plots, the creation of new housing places was only possible by increasing the density of the existing development. Therefore, it was planned to build a new house 3 with 55 living spaces in five floors between house 1 and house 2, along Steinickeweg. The construction plans could still be discussed with Werner Wirsing, and then Eberhard Steinert became the executive architect in cooperation with Tilmann Breitbach.
Fassade des Schollheims mit Haus 3 vom Steinickeweg aus (Ostseite)
After receiving the building permit from the city of Munich and after completion of the planning, the construction work could start in July 2017 with the demolition of the old garages in the courtyard. During the construction period, some residents had to move because some rooms fell victim to the reconstruction. About two years later, in October 2019, the completed, new rooms could be occupied. With a ceremonial speech by Munich’s Lord Mayor Dieter Reiter (SPD), the new house was officially inaugurated on January 14, 2020.
Facade of the Schollheim with house 3 from Steinickeweg (east side).
construction work in house 3 (to see: normal apartment)
The costs for the construction of House 3, the renovations to the existing building, the construction of the outdoor facilities and the furnishings amounted to approximately 6.6 million euros. More than half of this was raised by the non-profit association from its own funds and loans. The Free State of Bavaria contributed to the construction with a subsidy of approx. 40% of the costs.
Bauarbeiten im Haus 3 (zu sehen: normales Apartment)
Innenhof des Schollheims mit Dachterasse, im Hintergrund Westseite Haus 3
What is special about House 3 is above all that the 55 new residential units, in contrast to those in House 1 and House 2, are small apartments. This means that the rooms are equipped with a small kitchenette and a private bathroom. In addition, 13 of the 55 apartments have been designed as barrier-free housing units to make it easier for physically impaired people to live during their studies.
Inner courtyard of the Schollheim with roof terrace, in the background west side of house 3.
Renovations in the course of new construction
The new House 3 is located between House 1 and House 2 and is therefore directly connected to both. In the course of construction, 20 rooms were renovated in the first two houses. New sanitary facilities were also built and the heating system was upgraded to the latest state of the art. In order to increase the safety of the residents, the current fire protection requirements were implemented in all three houses.
The garage roof in the inner courtyard was planted with greenery to counteract the sealing of the surfaces in the interior and to make the view from the rooms more visually appealing. A raised terrace with trees, shrubs and benches was created. This can be used in a variety of ways as a beer garden, for parties and celebrations, or as a meeting place, to promote community.
Since bicycles are a popular means of transportation among students – after all, they are inexpensive, flexible and environmentally friendly – bicycle storage rooms for all residents were also created with the extension.
Future renovations
At present, a number of renovations are again in progress, including a fundamental replacement of distance windows, modern thermal insulation and measures to increase fire protection in Houses 1 and 2. These and other future repairs can only be financed in part from generated repair reserves.
