Siedlung Kunstfeld

After the secularisation of Altenberg Abbey in 1803, Wöllner and Friedrich Mannes leased the monastery buildings in 1809 and began producing Prussian blue, a textile dye used for Prussian uniforms. An explosion in November 1815 destroyed the monastery buildings and the roof of the neighbouring Altenberg Cathedral. The two partners then moved production to the former Premonstratensian monastery in Dünnwald, northeast of Mülheim am Rhein. Villagers complained about the strong smell, and in 1820 the Cologne district government banned Wöllner from producing within the village limits. He then bought land in the forest, which was known at the time as Maikammer.

Production initially consisted mostly of paints made from minerals of the Bergisches Land and/or Prussian blue, along with sal ammoniac, wood vinegar and sugar of lead, and around 1835 also eau de Cologne. Goods were sold as far as Brabant and Holland. Annual sales of 60,000 to 70,000 thalers would have been possible, but cheap imports from England prevented this. Later, several companies held licences, among them Christian Wöllner, a son of Johann Gottfried Wöllner, and Friedrich Mannes, the brothers Friedrich and Benjamin Sternenberg, and Ed. Halbach from Wald near Solingen. The historian Josef Thur names two chemical operations: coloured paints by the Mannes brothers from 1820 to 1840, and paints and sal ammoniac by the Sternenbergs until the 1830s.

In the late 1860s, Friedrich Sternenberg experimented with nitroglycerine and nitric acid to produce explosives, following the example of Alfred Nobel; Heinrich, another son of Benjamin Sternenberg, shared responsibility. The authorities demanded that the factory rooms be secured to protect workers and the public. Although Sternenberg initially received no licence, he made preparations without interference from the authorities. On the night of 25 January 1870, an explosion at the factory, which the settlement belonged to, killed 15 people – according to Pastor Christian Bertram, 14 Catholics and one non-Catholic. The shock is said to have been so strong that even in distant Cologne, pictures fell from walls and plaster from ceilings.