Technology

The Historical Museum of the 1920s and 1930s saw itself as a Frankfurt museum of local history with a focus on arts and crafts and a resolute stance against the modern metropolis. It was not until the end of the 1970s that the Historical Museum began to build up its current collections on modernism in the 19th and 20th centuries. The "Technology" collection was established at the same time.

One focus is on products from Frankfurt companies of supra-regional and global importance (Torpedo, Mayfarth, Deutsche Nähmaschinenfabrik, Voigt & Haeffner, Lahmeyer, Prometheus, Moenus, Wittekind & Pokorny, Max Braun).

In 1997, the Hartmann & Braun collection of instruments dating back to the 19th century was acquired. This world-leading company manufactured measuring and control technology devices in Frankfurt-Bockenheim from 1884 to 1997. It developed the spring galvanometer, the first usable electrical operating measuring instrument. From 1930, the company made the transition from measurement to control technology. The field of automation technology was added in 1949. A highlight of the collection is a large switchboard with Art Nouveau elements, which was in operation from 1898 to 1927.

Adlerwerke, founded in Frankfurt in 1880, initially only manufactured bicycles. In 1896, the company acquired the patents for an innovative type bar typewriter. Soon afterwards, Adlerwerke also built automobiles and motorcycles. The Triumph-Adler company was formed in 1956.

Technically significant objects from the Historical Museum are on permanent loan to three special museums in Frankfurt. The Schwanheim Transport Museum houses carriages from the horse-drawn tramway that has been in operation since 1872 and those from the Frankfurt am Main - Offenbach tramway that has been running since 1884. The Hochhuth technical collections house a Fries & Sohn steam engine from 1908, while the Museum of the Frankfurt Fire Brigade houses the first "steam pump" used by the Frankfurt fire department from 1887 and the manual pressure pump of the Hausen volunteer fire department from 1892.

With the inclusion of the modern metropolis and industrial city of the late 19th and 20th centuries, the museum returned to its roots as a museum of Frankfurt's entire history.