Zacharias Oppenheimer

Family

Notes

Otto's great-grandfather. Different person from Zacharias Oppenheimer of Gemmingen (Joseph Marum's son).

Son of Hayyim (Hayyum) Oppenheimer.

Father of Sigmund Seligmann Oppenheimer.

Geni: https://www.geni.com/people/Zacharias-Oppenheimer/6000000002766009103

Death date corrected from 24 to 21 February 1827: the engraved Stammbaum (AR 11074) and Geni's curated master profile agree independently on the 21st.

Buried at Waibstadt. Michelfeld had no Jewish cemetery of its own, so its Jewish residents were buried there (Geni curator note, Tobias Rachor, 17 Jan 2023).

Michelfeld lies in Baden, not Württemberg, and is today a district of Angelbachtal, Rhein-Neckar-Kreis.

Founded the woollen cloth factory in Michelfeld that became the family firm. Per the firm's own history (AR 7044): from 1803 he wove cloth to supply his father Hayum's manufactured-goods business, and by 1808 the works traded as 'Wollentuchfabrique Zacharias Oppenheimer und Herz Michel', employing 25–30 workers with an annual turnover of some 14,000–18,000 Baden gulden.

Became a Gemeindebürger under Baden's sixth constitutional edict — an exception among Jews, who were otherwise listed as Schutz- und Handelsjuden (AR 5248).

A portrait of him survives at the centre of the engraved Stammbaum (AR 11074).

DISAMBIGUATION: the 'von Gemmingen' who recur throughout the firm's history in AR 7044 are the Freiherren von Gemmingen-Hornberg and von Gemmingen-Michelfeld, the noble landowners whose Grundherrschaft covered Michelfeld. They are NOT connected to the village of Gemmingen where the other branch of this family lived.

Fifty-five grandchildren are recorded on Geni across his six children: Liebmann 9, Simon Wolf 20, Marx 10, Ludwig 11, August 5. None is named Adolph — see the note on the AR 6131 source record.

Burial at Waibstadt independently corroborated: Michelfeld's Jews were buried there from 1751, at Oberöwisheim before that, and the village opened its own Jewish cemetery only in 1868 — forty-one years after his death. [Alemannia Judaica, Michelfeld (Angelbachtal) synagogue page]

The factory's later history: it grew to 60–70 workers, won a silver medal at the 1861 Karlsruhe industrial exhibition for fine wool and finishing, and continued as the Gebr. Oppenheimer Wolltuchfabrik at Fabrikstraße 7. [Alemannia Judaica, Michelfeld (Angelbachtal) synagogue page]

NAME COLLISION: Alemannia Judaica also records a Zacharias Oppenheimer of Michelfeld born 8 January 1830, professor of medicine at Heidelberg from 1863, married to Mathilde Frank, died Heidelberg 1904. He is a later namesake — several of this Zacharias's grandsons were named after him — and must not be conflated with him.

NAMING CAUTION: the 1936 firm history records that a son christened Zacharias after his grandfather 'später nahm er den Namen Hugo an' — later took the name Hugo. The footnote does not identify whose son, so no individual is named here. Several of this Zacharias's grandsons were given his name, and at least one of them later went by Hugo: expect the same man to appear in some records as Zacharias and in others as Hugo.