The Man
Friedrich Wilhelm Raiffeisen was born on 30 March 1818 at Hamm/Sieg (Westerwald). He was the seventh out of nine children. His father Gottfried Friedrich Raif-feisen was a farmer and also mayor of Hamm for a while. One can go back to his family’s origin until the 16th century in the Swabian-Franconian area. The family of his mother, Amalie Christiane Susanna Maria, born Lantzendörffer, came from the “Siegerland”.
The young Raiffeisen chose the military career as a profession; this led him to Cologne, Coblenz and Sayn. An eye disease forced him to resign from the military ser-vice in 1843 and he went into the public service. In 1845, after a short period of train-ing, he became mayor in 1845 of the district of Weyerbusch in the Westerwald which consisted of 25 parishes.
The same year, Raiffeisen married the apothecary’s daughter Emilie Storck from Remagen upon Rhine. Seven children were born to this marriage, however three died very early. Their eldest daughter Amalie staid single and was during many years Raiffeisen’s faithful secretary. Their son Rudolf was chairman of the Raiffeisen organization from 1889 till 1892.
Due to his achievements, Raiffeisen became mayor of the larger district of Flammersfeld in 1848 and of Heddesdorf near Neuwied in 1852.
Raiffeisen’s wife died in 1863 after a long lasting heart disease at the age of 36 years. While visiting some ill persons during a typhus epidemic, Raiffeisen got infected. As a consequence, his eyesight deteriorated much more so that he had to go into retirement at the end of 1865 at the early age of 47 years.
His small pension was not sufficient to meet the living of Raiffeisen’s family. Therefore he tried to reach additional income at first with a small cigar factory and then with a wine business.
In 1867, he married the widow Maria Panseroth. She outlived him by 12 years; their marriage staid childless. On 11 March 1888, shortly before his 70th birthday, Friedrich Wilhelm Raiffeisen passed away in Neuwied-Heddesdorf.