Children's Sanatorium "Helmut Just"
The history of this building goes back to the 1920s, when the head of administration of the health insurance fund (Ersatzkasse) of the trade union federation of employees had a children's sanatorium built on the recommendation of its members. An architectural competition was launched, which was eventually won by Georg Wünschmann with a design in the “New Objectivity” style.
The children's sanatorium was built on the former vineyard site of the family of honorary citizen Wilhelm Schall (1828 to 1916). The town had acquired the vineyard, parceled it out and sold it to prospective builders.
The new building area was given the name “Neu-Frankenhausen”. Construction began in 1926 and the building was completed in 1927.
The building was erected by “MIMA”, Mitteldeutsche Massiv-Sparbau GmbH from Frankenhausen, under the management of Mr. Carl Boettger, who also brought in other contractors for the construction. The facades of the building are mainly made of shell limestone.
In 1929, the spa house - the “Hermann Hedrich Home”, as it was known - was given its own brine water pipeline for spa treatments. Mr. Hedrich also brought the matron (the headmistress, the manager) for the house from his hometown of Hamburg and also the first nurses to look after the patients. In the following years, many sick and weak children from the Hamburg area recovered here. In 1935, a saltwater bathing hall was added to the left of the house.
When the first bombs were dropped on Bad Frankenhausen by airplanes during the Second World War, the recreation home was closed. It was probably not reopened until 1949.
The building also served as a children's sanatorium and children's spa during the GDR era. However, the name was changed because Hermann Hedrich not only came from West Germany, he was also not a worker or farmer - so the name did not fit in with the socialist self-image. So the building was given the honorary name “Helmut Just”.
However, this Helmut Just has nothing to do with the building. He had probably never visited Bad Frankenhausen. The "Hedrich-Heim" was given this new name as a memorial to him, because Just was a very young GDR Berlin border policeman. Born in Berlin on July 2, 1933, he had trained as a painter and then served with the border police in Berlin. During this service he was killed on December 30, 1952, he was fatally shot by an illegal border crosser during a brief exchange of fire. He was not even 20 years old.
Until the German reunification in 1990, the children's sanatorium was one of the most important children's health resorts in the GDR. It was finally closed in 1991.
In 2020, the town of Bad Frankenhausen decided to revitalize the building, which had been unused for almost three decades. A project developer planned to convert the historic main building into modern, barrier-free vacation apartments, taking into account the listed building status. In a second phase, ecological garden lodges and communal facilities were to be created on the surrounding open spaces. The entire complex was designed as a self-catering vacation park aimed at both individual travelers and families. The city's tourist and gastronomic offerings were to be consciously integrated in order to exploit synergies and avoid creating competitive situations.
The conversion of the former sanatorium into a vacation resort represents a significant development for Bad Frankenhausen and combines the historical significance of the site with a new tourist use.
The ground-breaking ceremony was held in 2022 and completion of the main building is planned for 2024/25.
A look at the plans and the current status of construction and renovation can be obtained here: salzgut.de
Visited: November 16, 2020
Location: Bad Frankenhausen/Kyffhäuser, Germany
Status: Renovation
