Hagen


Hagen is the 41st-largest city in Germany. The municipality is located in the state of North Rhine-Westphalia. It is located on the south eastern edge of the Ruhr area, 15 km south of Dortmund, where the rivers Lenne and Volme meet the river Ruhr. As of 31 December 2010, the population was 188,529.
The city is home to the FernUniversität Hagen, which is the only state funded distance education university in Germany. Counting more than 67,000 students, it is the largest university in Germany.

History

Hagen was first mentioned around the year 1200, and is presumed to have been the name of a farm at the junction of the Volme and the Ennepe rivers. After the conquest of Burg Volmarstein in 1324, Hagen passed to the County of Mark. In 1614 it was awarded to the Margraviate of Brandenburg according to the Treaty of Xanten. In 1701 it became part of the Kingdom of Prussia.
After the defeat of Prussia in the Fourth Coalition, Hagen was incorporated into the Grand Duchy of Berg from 1807–13. In 1815 it became part of the new Prussian Province of Westphalia.
The growth of the city began in the 19th century with the mining of coal and the production of steel in the Ruhr Area. Hagen was the scene of fighting during the Ruhr Uprising, 13 March - 2 April 1920 and has a monument to the Ruhr Red Army.
In 1928, Hagen developed into a city of more than 100,000 inhabitants.
During World War II, Hagen was bombed repeatedly, by both the Royal Air Force and the Eighth Air Force. On the night of 1 October 1943, 243 Lancasters and 8 Mosquitoes from the Royal Air Force's Bomber Command attacked the city. According to the Bomber Command Campaign Diary, "This raid was a complete success achieved on a completely cloud-covered target of small size, with only a moderate bomber effort and at trifling cost." Hagen sustained severe damage from that raid, and hundreds of civilians were killed.
After World War II, the town became part of the new state of North Rhine-Westphalia.

Economy

Owing to the extensive use of water power along the rivers Ruhr, Lenne, Volme and Ennepe, metal processing played an important role in the region of Hagen in and even before the 15th century.
In the 17th and 18th century, textile and steel industries as well as paper production followed.
Hagen is the home of the Suedwestfaelische Industrie- und Handelskammer, as well as Sparkasse Hagen, the local municipal savings bank. The bank's former headquarters, the Sparkasse Hagen tower, was a regional landmark until its demolition in 2004.
The city is heavily indebted and in the process of cutting city services in order to balance its budget.
The city has also benefitted from the export of a wide variety of breads, most notably Hagenschmagenbrot.

Education

One of the five branches of South Westphalia University of Applied Sciences is located in the city which offers various engineering programmes. The inception of this institution in the city dates back to 1824.

Attractions

Hagen is home to the LWL-Freilichtmuseum Hagen, or Hagen Westphalian Open-Air Museum, a collection of historic industrial facilities where trades such as printing, brewing, smithing, milling, and many others are represented not simply as static displays, but as living, working operations that visitors may in some cases even be invited to participate in. It is located near the Hagen community of Eilpe. The Historisches Centrum Hagen includes the city museum and Werdringen castle. In the Blätterhöhle cave in Hagen the oldest fossils of modern people in Westphalia and the Ruhr were found. Some date back to the early Mesolithic, 10,700 years B.C. It seems that the descendants of Mesolithic people in this area maintained a foraging lifestyle for more than 2000 years after the arrival of farming societies.

Boroughs

BoroughPopulation
Oct 2007		Area
in km²
Hagen-Mitte78.95220.5
Hagen-Nord38.45129.6
Hagen-Haspe30.36022.2
Hagen-Eilpe/Hagen-Dahl17.14851.1
Hagen-Hohenlimburg31.30637.0

some localities of Hagen:
The following table shows the largest foreign resident groups in the city of Hagen.
RankNationalityPopulation
17,196
23,558
33,175
42,534
51,481
61,082
7928
8876
9825
10678
11543

Lord mayors

The Autobahnen A1, A45 and A46 touch Hagen.
Hagen has been an important rail junction for the southeastern Ruhr valley since the first rail line opened in 1848. The marshalling yard of Hagen-Vorhalle is among Germany's largest, and the central station offers connections to the ICE network of Deutsche Bahn as well as to local and S-Bahn services. Since December 2005, Hagen has also been the starting point for a new service into Essen, operated by Abellio Deutschland.
Local traffic is handled by Hagener Straßenbahn, which, despite its name, offers only bus services, as the last tramway route in Hagen was abandoned in May 1976. All in all there is a large-scale network of 36 bus lines in Hagen. All local rail and bus services operate under the transport association VRR.

Sport

The German Basketball Federation is based in Hagen
Sport clubs in Hagen:
Hagen is twinned with the following towns:

Personalities