Waggonbau Görlitz

The Waggonbau Görlitz Corporation (Görlitz Rolling Stock Corporation) has built locomotives and rolling stock since 1849. They are best known for the double-deck rail cars that have been in production since 1935 in Görlitz, Germany. The Görlitz plants have been sold to Bombardier Transportation in 1998 making them available under the Bombardier Double-deck Coach brand (not to be confused with the North-American Bombardier BiLevel Coaches).

The origins go back to the saddle-maker Johann Christoph Lüders to open his workshop on June 5, 1828, in Görlitz at the Obermarkt (Upper Market). A year later in April 1829 he moved to the Langengasse (Longmen Alley) starting to build coaches. The works grew so that he moved to Demianiplatz (Demiani Square). The same year, a public tender from Görlitz that asked for two rail cars to be built for the forest works in the Görlitzer Heide (Görlitz Heath) was won by Johann Christoph Lüders and Conrad Schiedt on October 19, 1849. Conrad Schiedt owned a metal works shop in the Büttnergasse (Cooper Alley) producing the iron parts required for the otherwise wooden rail coaches. Lüders moved the rolling stock manufactory to the Brunnenstrasse (Well Street) the same year.

The rolling stock works continued to flourish during rail transport expansion in Germany and the German Customs Union. Already in 1852, he delivered 81 rail cars and by the end of the year the factory employed 205 men from nine trades. He bought a number of buildings at Well Street and he established a factory with steam hammers in 1853 at the site – the beginning of industrial production. The number of employees grew to 500 in 1862. The rail car deliveries grew to 300 in 1856 and 426 in 1869 including military equipment. In 1869 Lüders agreed to sell the factories to the Berlin merchant J. Mamroth for 600,000 thaler.

The new owner went to reorganize the works into a stock corporation to allow for further expansion. The initial public offering on February 3, 1869, with an initial size of 800,000 was overrun with a 2,000,000-thaler signing for shares by February 10. On May 26, the Lüders factories were bought by the stock corporation that registered on June 21, 1869. Lüders was offered a position of technical director but he denied – the first director was to be Heinrich August Samann. In 1872, the company built 2,000 rail cars (mostly baggage cars and freight cars), employing 1,222 workers. Due to rising costs for raw material, the first dividend payout was not before 1875.

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Wikipedia