Vol. XXXII ˇ 2001 ˇ pp. 25-46 (22)

Robert Nemes

Download full article (113 KB) [subscribers only]

Abstract

On January 13, 1843, the executive committee of the Hungarian Industrial Association (Országos Iparegyesület) held its weekly meeting in Pest. The Industrial Association, a voluntary association dedicated to the spread of useful knowledge and the promotion of industry, had been founded fourteen months earlier. More than twenty men were present at the meeting, most of them untitled nobles, yet four counts, two master artisans (both button makers), and a Jewish merchant were present as well. Records suggest that this was a busy meeting, in which the executive committee passed a dozen resolutions on topics ranging from the printing of the association's bylaws to its plans to establish a library and launch a newspaper. Among other matters, the committee acknowledged receipt of a fifty-florin contribution from the Pest Jewish community and welcomed as a branch association a society dedicated to promoting industry and agriculture among Hungarian Jews. At the suggestion of Lajos Kossuth, the vice-director of the association, the committee voted to invest part of its limited capital in local construction projects "that promote domestic industry and the class of workers employed in it." Near the end of the meeting, the committee considered an inventor's letter offering to sell the Industrial Association the secret to preventing the rusting of pots (az üstök incrustatiója elháritásának arcanumát). After a lengthy discussion, a subcommittee was duly appointed to consider this invention.