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Merchant Simon Salomon - who was not related to 18th-century Lüneburg "Schutzjude" Joseph Salomon and his family - was born in Winsen/Luhe in late 1818. He was the fourth child of Joseph and Bräunchen Salomon née Heinemann (who was a sister of Simon Heinemann). Around 1830, he moved from Winsen to Lüneburg.
Along with his cousin Marcus Heinemann, he quickly became one of the most important figures in Lüneburg"s Jewish community. He was a merchant and a tanner, and is also referred to as leather manufacturer, hide and leather broker, saltworks founder, and brickyard owner.
Around 1840 he married Sophie van Biema, a native of Leer. Together, they had eleven children, ten of them reached adulthood. None of their children remained in Lüneburg for a long time.
Simon Salomon was the head of the Lüneburg synagogue congregation for many years, starting in 1858. He was also a constituent member of the Lüneburg Chamber of Commerce, founded in 1866. At the same time, he was politically active: he belonged to Rudolf von Bennigsen"s Progress Party.
As an entrepreneur, he was very successful and always had new ideas. Together with the Simon Heinemann company and other Lüneburg merchants, he was a partner in the briefly successful "Salz-Sozietät" from 1851-1859 which tried to compete with the long-established Lüneburg salt works. In 1861, together with others, Simon Salomon founded a brickyard near Wilschenbruch, on the outskirts of the town, which produced yellow bricks not previously used in Lüneburg.
During the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-71, Simon Salomon volunteered as a so-called non-combatant to care for the wounded and sick. After the end of the war, Emperor Wilhelm I awarded him with a war medal for his services.
Simon Salomon died from a heart attack in Lüneburg in 1889. He was buried in the Jewish cemetery. His widow Sophie died five years later and was buried next to him.
Sources and info (in German):
https://www.jüdische-gemeinden.de/index.php/gemeinden/u-z/2103-winsen-luhe-niedersachsen
Breinche Salomon"s gravestone inscription, Winsen-Luhe
Joseph Salomon"s gravestone inscription, Winsen-Luhe
Wilhelm Reinecke, Geschichte der Stadt Lüneburg, Zweiter Band, Lüneburg 1933 (Neudruck 1977), p. 488
Simon Salomon"s war medal for non-combatants, Franco-Prussian War 1870-71, Jüdisches Museum Berlin
Manfred Göske, Manuscript "Zur Geschichte der jüdischen Gemeinde in Lüneburg", Göske Collection, Lüneburg Museum
Certificate of award of the War Medal 1870/71 for non-combatants to leather manufacturer Simon Salomon (1818-1889), Jüdisches Museum Berlin
