Feuerhand Lanterns — History of the Nier Company and the Feuerhand Brand
Feuerhand is one of the best known European storm lantern brands. The mark is a hand holding a flame. The brand name was placed next to the mark in later years.
This page was revised in 2024 with information supplied by Jörg Wekeman, who corrected a number of errors in the earlier version. Historic photographs are used by courtesy of feuerhand.info.
Beierfeld, 1870 to 1902
Hermann Nier ran a plumber's workshop in Beierfeld from 1870. Alongside that trade he made a wide range of metal goods. Workshops of this kind were giving way to factories with machine production.
In 1898 the Nier brothers' firm was taken over by Frankonia Albert Frank Metalware. The brothers stayed on as production managers. Hermann Nier left in 1902 after disagreements and started his own storm lantern production. He filed a patent for the manufacture of storm lanterns in the same year.
His son Bruno Nier became the driving force behind Feuerhand in the early twentieth century.
The Nier works at Beierfeld. The print is undated. Courtesy of feuerhand.info.
Between the wars
Models that sold in large numbers before the Second World War were the Feuerhand 201, the 75 Atom, the 175, the 275 and the 276. The Atom is the most sought after of these among collectors today.
Feuerhand also became known for the Sturmkappe, a cap that gave the lantern extra protection against wind.
Feuerhand and Dietz were the two largest storm lantern producers in the world between 1918 and 1938.
A display of Feuerhand lanterns. Whether this is a shop window or a trade fair stand is not recorded. Courtesy of feuerhand.info.
The Second World War and the expropriation
Sales collapsed during the war.
Beierfeld lay in the Soviet occupation zone. After the war the Nier family was expropriated and the machinery was dismantled and shipped to the Soviet Union. Ernst Bruno Nier was arrested by the Soviet authorities. He died in Bautzen in 1950.
The family fled to Lüdenscheid in Westphalia and restarted storm lantern production there on a small scale. They moved to Hohenlockstedt afterwards.
A pocket mirror given away as a business gift. It advertises the No. 75, No. 175, No. 225 and No. 275. Courtesy of feuerhand.info.
Two producers, one design
The building in Beierfeld still held the blueprints. It was brought back into production by VVB VEB Nirona-Feuerhand.
The Feuerhand name remained with the Nier family. The Beierfeld works therefore sold its lanterns under the name Bat, which became a well known storm lantern brand in its own right.
For collectors this is the point where identification matters. Lanterns of the same design left two different factories under two different names for several decades.
After 1953
Nier re-established itself on the international market from 1953. The peak years of the storm lantern had passed by then.
Müller, Feuerhand GmbH and Petromax
The Nier family left the original company in 1989. Wilfried Müller took over production, and later his son Marc-Michael Müller. The brand rights were held by Müller GmbH from 1990 and by Feuerhand GmbH afterwards.
Feuerhand GmbH was founded in 2003 and went bankrupt in 2012. The Feuerhand name has been held by the Petromax group since 2014.
Sources
Jörg Wekeman, correspondence, 2024. Corrections to an earlier version of this page.
feuerhand.info. Company history and historic photographs.
