Sophie Emilie Beha A Catalyst in Tune with the Times – 50 Years Ernst von Siemens Music Foundation

Ernst von Siemens was many things – including a catalyst for the arts. By establishing the Ernst von Siemens Music Foundation in 1972, he made projects and careers possible – far beyond his own lifetime. The grandson of company founder Werner von Siemens, Ernst was born on 9 April 1903, just southwest of London in Coombe House, Kingston Hill. He spent his childhood and youth on the family estate, the Heinenhof in Potsdam, surrounded by ten acres of parkland and two lakes. As idyllic as this might sound, Ernst von Siemens was but 15 years old when Germany and its allies lost the First World War. Just a few months earlier, he had received his school report from the Real-Gymnasium in Potsdam which read: “Behaviour: good; attention and diligence: sufficient; Obersekunda exam [11th grade].”

After graduating from high school, Ernst von Siemens went to Munich to study “a technical subject,” as stipulated by his father Carl Friedrich. He opted for physics. Ernst von Siemens was diligent: Just five years later, he wrote his dissertation on spectral measurements. At the same time, he contracted polio – the consequences of which he would suffer for the rest of his life, but he did not let this get him down. Two years later, at the age of 26, Ernst von Siemens took his first step into professional life, naturally in the family business. As the years went by, the passionate mountaineer and hiker also continued his professional ascent: In 1941, he finally became general representative of the company – in the middle of World War II, i.e. at the most difficult time imaginable. The Siemens company was classified “a key part of the war effort” by the National Socialist regime. This also meant that tens of thousands of forced labourers were employed in production during the Second World War. These were skilled workers, unskilled workers from Eastern and Western Europe or concentration camp prisoners.

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