Decline and new Beginning under August Hermann Niemeyer

Francke’s successors continued their work entirely in his spirit. However, this prevented the institutions from keeping pace with the rapid intellectual and above all pedagogical developments of the Enlightenment. This led to a decline in the second half of the 18th century: the institutions’ education was criticised as backward, and the number of pupils fell dramatically. This further exacerbated the economic problems that the Seven Years’ War had wrought.

At the turn of the 19th century, the highly erudite theologian and widely respected educationalist August Hermann Niemeyer, who was also respected as a politician, poet and publicist and was associated with Goethe, Schiller and other greats of his time, was able to inject modern Enlightenment impulses into the foundations and lead them to a new flourishing. He managed to obtain permanent financial support from the Prussian king. At the same time, however, this meant abandoning the independence and economic autonomy of the Francke Foundations. He introduced new methods of education and teaching, above all encouraging pupils to think for themselves and to work independently. These measures led to an increase in the number of pupils and a gratifying upswing of the foundations. For these reasons, Niemeyer, Francke’s great-grandson, was already celebrated by his contemporaries as the second founder of the foundations.