30-Dec-2003

"We have dispossessed ourselves" article about Stromer trust and Grünsberg Castle

Family turns property into a trust, thus giving Grünsberg Castle a future.
(translated article taken from the newspaper "Nürnberger Nachrichtenr" by Horst M. Auer, 30-Dec-2003)
For others just a dream, for her it is daily routine: a life on the own castle. However, latest during the night when the wind is whizzling through all gaps and rotten foundations are crumbling, for many castle owners romantic fantasies can quickly turn into a nightmare. The efforts required for maintaining the historic heritage of the ancestors is shown by the example of the baronial family Stromer von Reichenbach of Grünsberg Castle near Altdorf.
Grünsberg Castle resides on an outcrop of a side gorge of the Schwarzach valley. At three sides of the well-fortified walls steep slopes provide additional protection. The idyllic location at the edge of the forest is troubled only by the car traffic, whizzing by on the heavy traffic road Altdorf-Burgthann.
During the past five centuries many Nuremberg patrician families have been the lords of this Staufer castle. At the beginning of the 18th century, the Paumgartner family turned the main building into a palace with representative rooms. With its outer bailey, chapel and Palas, with turret and gatehouse the monument today still is appearing like the prototype of a small medieval castle. "Only the draw bridge is missing", says Rotraut Freifrau Stromer von Reichenbach-Baumbauer.
250 years ago Grünsberg Castle came to the possession of the patrician family. Experts attribute the facility to the nicest manors in the county of Nuremberg. Once the mighty gate is open, the view falls onto a dreamy inner yard including coach house and parapet walk. Or onto the so-called Billiard building where once the professors of the university of Altdorf met for playing games. The rooms of the main building have a museum character: they are stucco-adorned and accomodate many art treasures and valuable furniture. It seems that the time is standing still since 1720.
Prof. Wolfgang Freiherr Stromer von Reichenbach used to live in the first floor until he died in the year 1999. "He always had put his heart and soul into the preservation of the monument", remembers his daughter. Everything he earned from the Stromer estate - 86 hectares of land, 50 hectares of which being forest - over many years, flew into the restoration of the castle being under monument protection since 1943.

Shortly before his death he paved the way for founding a public trust. "Stromer’sche Kulturgut-, Denkmal- und Naturstiftung" exists since the year 2000. "Basically, we have dispossessed ourselves.", says Stromer-Baumbauer about herself and her siblings being entitled to an inheritance as well. Two of them are living in subsidiary buildings of the castle. "We don't possess a single stone here anymore". Stromer-Baumbauer has a life estate in Grünsberg Castle as well, lives in a row house in Erlangen, though. Here is the piano teacher's centre of life. She enjoys bicycling downtown for shopping. Now she is the administrator of the castle on a complimentary basis. Being a city child, in former days she often used to live here with her father during the summer months. The administrator knows that keeping a manor like Grünsberg Castle in good constructional condition is a never-ending effort. But she is also aware that without the trust the family most likely would have been obliged to sell the historic heritage. Only the solution found in the year 2000 justifies the hope "that not everything having been built-up over centuries will not be scattered into all the winds." The earnings of the trust not only finance the regular maintenance but also restorations. In 2001 the first phase of the general restoration has been completed. The cost of the construction work amounted to 700,000 €. The Stromers had contributed 168,000 € and for this they had plundered their family casket. The rest could be compensated for by public subsidies. Upcoming are the repair of ailing chimneys and the roofs of the parapet walk. Additionally, there are static issues at the steep slopes above the gorge. Concerning the Billiard building "the corners are threatening to break down. They are standing only by habit", Stromer-Baumbauer says. The costs for the pending second construction phase will sum up to 2.5 Mio €. Without the trust and the public fundings this load could not be shouldered. However, for the financing "family silver" has to be sacrificed as well: The revenues from selling land at the village boundary of Grünsberg are part of the plan. Here building ground will be set out. To be very clear: Without the non-profit trust the public subsidies for this ensemble of supraregional importance would flow much more sparsely.