1876: Goethestraße bears the name of the poet
If you shop in Frankfurt's Goethestraße, you don't usually have to count the pennies. The street has an elegant glamour, which can perhaps be interpreted as a sign of high respect for the prince of poets. In contrast, Offenbach's Goethestraße appears far more reserved. Nor did it bear the poet's name from the outset.
When it appeared on the city map in the middle of the 19th century and was slowly built on from Kaiserstrasse westwards, it was still called Kreuzstrasse. This was derived from the name of the area "Im steinernen Kreuz". In ancient times, a stone devotional or expiatory cross probably stood there. The street has only been called Goethename since 1876.
Where Goethestraße meets Kaiserstraße, the dome of the "Capitol" event venue catches the eye today. The dominant building was inaugurated as a synagogue in 1916. It was not yet standing when local historian Friedrich Jöst published a guide to the city in book form in 1905. In Jöst's book, the dominant buildings are still the house of the Offenbach Gymnastics Club (TVO), completed in 1886, and its vis-a-vis, the "Goethe School".
This is not to be confused with today's Goethe School on Bernardstraße. The school at Goethestrasse 10 is now known as the Fröbelschule. In 1905, it was a private school with a boarding school that led to the intermediate school leaving certificate, the "one-year certificate". With this qualification, volunteers could shorten their military service to one year. The school advertised a special service: "Homework is done under the supervision of the teachers at the school".
Friedrich Jöst boasts that the gymnastics building opposite was built in just nine months. The TVO spent 59,000 marks on the grounds, the gymnastics equipment and the rest of the fixtures and fittings. A later extension made it possible for the gymnasium to become a social center for the town. The band of the Offenbach infantry regiment frequently gave concerts. The Royal Music Director Glück's music school had its domicile at the TVO. Lecture evenings found their audience. When the "Committee for Popular Lectures" promised a lecture with photographs, there was rarely an empty chair.
Our city guide from 1905 points out that the house was also the home of the Fechtriege, as well as "the singing choir of the gymnastics club under the protectorate of the Grand Duke". The author notes: "The latter is the most important male choir in our town." Finally, the medical corps of the TVO is mentioned, "which covered itself with great fame in the war of 1870/71, partly on the battlefield and partly at home". In Offenbach, the medical corps maintained 19 stations "in order to be able to provide immediate assistance in the event of accidents".
Goethestraße had been in existence for almost ten years when a "promenade" was laid out further west, which was given the name Goethering. It seems as if Offenbach wanted to emphasize that the great man was "a boy from the neighbourhood". We know of his summer in Offenbach in 1775 with Lili Schönemann, but he also returned several times in his more mature years. In 1779, he stayed with the writer Sophie von La Roche in Domstrasse, in 1814 with Privy Councillor Metzler on Linsenberg and in the Schwanenapotheke with Dr. Bernhard Meyer, the doctor, pharmacist and naturalist. "In this well-built and increasingly cheerful place," Goethe wrote about Offenbach in 1814, "the collection of stuffed birds belonging to Privy Councillor Meyer deserves all the attention."
The following year, 1815, he once again knocked on the door of Metzler and Meyer, as well as the ingenious coin forger Karl Wilhelm Becker, known to the people of Offenbach only as "Antiken-Becker". The visitor from Weimar also made notes about this: "Hofrat Becker in Offenbach showed important paintings, coins and gems, not averse to giving the enthusiast one or the other desirable thing. With regard to natural history, we saw the collection of birds at Hofrat Meyer, not without new instruction on this wonderful branch of natural history." There is no doubt that such a prominent figure, who is repeatedly drawn to Offenbach, deserves at least two street names. Lothar R. Braun