Die unbekannte Seite Fritz Leonhardts - Sein Beitrag zum Stahlbau

The unknown angle of Fritz Leonhardt - His contribution to steel construction

Fritz Leonhardt (1909-1999) is one of the best known civil engineers of the 20th century. Publicly best known is his television tower in Stuttgart, civil engineers perceive him as a constructor of bridges, whose publications on pre-stressed concrete set a standard. With this paper we focus on the less known role of Leonhardt as a steel constructor. His early works are mainly dedicated to this branch. With these constructions his fame within the civil engineering community startes. Additionally, after World War II Leonhardt had been one of the outstanding engineers developing light weight structures that had a great influence on the architecture of the Federal Republic of Germany. From a historical point of view, the personal networks created by Leonhardt are of special interest: his contacts to architects like Paul Bonatz, Gerd Lohmer, and engineers like Otto Graf in Stuttgart were formative for his rapid advancement in post-war Germany.