Ringkøbing - or Ringkjøbing - is a market town in West Jutland
with 9,923 inhabitants (2020), located in Ringkøbing Parish. The
town is located by Vonå and the northeast corner of Ringkøbing
Fjord. Ringkøbing is the largest city in Ringkøbing-Skjern
Municipality and belongs to the Central Jutland Region.
In
the summer, Ringkøbing is strongly influenced by tourism, not least
because a lot of holiday home guests are attracted to the North Sea
and shop in the city. One of the city's largest workplaces is Vestas
Nacelles, which is located at the city's small industrial port and
since 1998 has installed nacelles and wing hubs for Vestas MW
turbines.
In 2007, the Cambridge Institute named Ringkøbing
Europe's happiest city. Behind the appointment is a European survey,
which is conducted every two years.
In Ringkøbing you will find a lot of old houses as well as a number
of charming cobbled streets and alleys. The oldest building is Rindum
Church, which dates from the 13th century. By the square is Ringkøbing
Church from the beginning of the 15th century; its tower from c. 1550 is
the city's landmark and rather specially constructed, as the tall
building becomes wider upwards. At Torvet you will also find Hotel
Ringkøbing, a half-timbered building from approx. 1600; it has been a
guesthouse and hotel since 1833 and is thus one of the country's oldest
hotels. The mayor's farm next door dates from 1817.
In Nygade
stands a statue of J.C. Christensen, who was Danish Prime Minister from
1905-08. In the small square at the end of Algade stands a staue of the
city child, Greenland explorer, journalist and author Ludvig
Mylius-Erichsen. The statue is back in its original place in front of
Ringkøbing Museum, where it was erected in 1916, but for a number of
years it was located in Nygade.
On the corner of Nørregade and
Nygade you will find Ringkøbing Bio in the stately building Nørrehus,
which has been a gathering place for the town since its opening in 1909.
Ringkøbing Bio is run by a cinema association that has taken over the
operation after the Pedersen family, who ran the cinema for 90 years
from 1909 until 1999.
The town was called in 1340: Rennumkøpingh, in 1345: Rænnumkøpingh, in 1368: Rennekøping (Latin: Rincopia). The name is probably derived from the nearby parish Rindum, which was also originally called Rænnum.
Ringkøbing is an old town that probably dates back to the 13th century; the first time its privileges are mentioned is 1443, when they were confirmed by Christopher of Bavaria, later they were often confirmed and extended, thus in 1482, 1515, 1545, 1586, 1608 and 1648.
While in 1368 no merchant was allowed to export goods from the city's
harbor without paying duty in Ribe, Christian IV on 20 October 1599
boasted of being a customs office with unimpeded loading of all goods
just like other legal customs offices. In particular, the export of axes
was an important source of income for the city at that time. The export
in this part of the country previously only took place above Ribe, but
on 8 February 1553, later repeated, the town was allowed to export
stable axes, but not pasture axes, against the usual duty. All in all,
next to fishing, trade has probably been its most important means of
livelihood. Trade was mainly conducted in Norway and the Netherlands,
but also in Hamburg.
However, Ringkøbing remained a small town
despite its good catchment area and apparently favorable location on the
formerly much more navigable fjord. It thus never had more than one
church and no monastery in the Middle Ages. Its most flourishing time
falls in the 16th century and the first half of the 17th century.
During the Count's Feud, Johan Rantzau and his troops were in the
town on their way from Varde to Aalborg in 1534. The town had then been
abandoned by the citizens. It has been alleged that Rantzau and the
troops burned the town, but this is probably due to an erroneous
correction of a letter from Rantzau.
As late as 1656, Arent
Berntsen could say about it: "Ringkøbing is probably not of much size,
but it has some wealthy citizens who negotiate large lots of grain and
axes from the country and ship them back to Holland and other places".
But already in a priest's report from 1638 it is stated that there: "may
be about a hundred citizens in the town, most of them of very little
wealth". Several accidents contributed to its decline, for example a
flood on 1 December 1615, when the surrounding fields were destroyed,
the town's boats were broken up, and 34 farms and houses suffered more
or less damage. The king exempted the victims from tax for 3 years. In
1624 the city again suffered from inundation, and in the wars of the
17th century, especially in 1644 and 1657-60, when first the enemy and
then the allies haunted it; fires have probably also ravaged it, even if
there have been no reports of any extensive fires. Added to this were
the increasingly difficult and difficult sailing conditions in the fjord
as the Nyminde Gab began to migrate south from about the middle of the
17th century (in the 17th and 18th centuries oysters were also caught in
the fjord, but the migration of the Gab to the south and the the
following exclusion of salt water caused them to disappear).
After the regulation of 28 January 1682, Ringkøbing continued to be
among the cities that were allowed to conduct foreign trade. In 1682 it
was also determined that in the future it should have a mayor, as
before, but only 2 councilors (previously up to 8).
A Latin
school, mentioned in 1547, was abolished in 1739.
An assessment
of the city's plots and properties shows how the condition was in the
second half of the 17th century: there were a total of 142 No. (valued
at 8,732 reichsdaler 3 marks), and of these 46 were empty construction
sites. In 1695 an explanation was demanded as to what had happened to
these empty sites, but only very few of them had been used, and 2 other
farms had remained empty since that time. According to a census from
1710 with 102 citizens, with an explanation of everyone's conditions,
the city was in the greatest misery: "here are many deserted places,
many widows and few citizens, most of whom have recovered due to
unfortunate sea damage and loss of their merchantship. " In 1743 it is
reported that several people had to sell farms and houses due to the
strange decrease in the industry, and in 1745 the town is said to have
to go under completely if it is not helped in any way. According to the
Danish Atlas, the town had 506 inhabitants in 1769 compared to 623 in
1672, that its industry was more in decline than in growth, trade was
down, since the town was no longer a warehouse for other market towns,
shipping was small and only went to Norway with grain and fatty products
etc. The city, which had previously had 10-12 ships, now had only one;
the others who were transported were foreigners. After that time,
however, things progressed somewhat: in 1774, the town's merchants,
partly as shipowners, partly as charterers, had a total of 12 ships;
most belonged to the town's two most enterprising merchants, Jens Tang,
owner of Nørre Vosborg (died 1826), and Jens Bjerg Rindom.
Well,
almost all ships were lost in the War of 1807-14, but as early as 1816
there were 14 ships, and in the same year 300, mostly Norwegian, ships
were cleared and cleared. In 1829 there were 11 ships with a total of
147 commercial cargo. Trading conditions were described in 1833 as
fairly good; while previously a large part of the western rain products
were sent from Ringkøbing and the surrounding area to Lemvig for export,
they were then carried out from Ringkøbing itself, partly because the
road through the Limfjord to Aalborg became less navigable due to the
conditions at Løgstør Grunde, partly and especially because during the
war 1807-14 had had to fetch many necessities from Hamburg overland,
whereby Ringkøbing from that time became like a staple town, as the
English could not enter under the coast and take the small vessels that
went to Ringkøbing. But conditions changed when the Agger Canal was
opened and the Løgstør Canal was built, and the sailing conditions on
Ringkøbing Fjord became more and more unfavorable.
Ringkøbing
County was founded in 1794, and the town became a county seat.
The first early beginnings for industrial development in Ringkøbing
county took place at the end of the 18th century. The market town of
Ringkøbing developed small factories, which perhaps did not differ
significantly from craft sites. A pharmacist Broager set up a small
lacquer and chocolate factory in 1780. In 1787, a group of the town's
most important merchants joined together to set up a tobacco factory and
in 1791 one of the merchants, Jens Harpøth, set up a tannery and leather
factory. In 1801 a card factory was added and in 1805-06 another tobacco
factory. In 1811 and 1817, two more tobacco factories were added. These
companies were closely linked to trade. In 1830, Ringkøbing got another
tobacco factory. Lemvig got its first tobacco factory in 1837, but it
was not until R. Færchs Fabrikker in 1869 that Holstebro became a
tobacco town. Around 1900, Færch gradually bought other tobacco
factories in the area and later R. Færch became the sole authority in
the county.
Ringkøbing's population was increasing in the late 1800s and early
1900s: 1,274 in 1850, 1,331 in 1855, 1,409 in 1860, 1,546 in 1870, 2,035
in 1880, 2,290 in 1890, 2,712 in 1901, 2. 938 in 1906 and 3,528 in 1911.
At the turn of the century, the city had factories and industrial
facilities: 2 tobacco factories (one, Mølgaards, was founded in 1830 and
had approx. 85 workers), 1 organ factory (Andresens, founded in 1890), 1
wool spinning mill and clothing factory (joint stock company from 1901,
share capital DKK 24,000 .), 1 wagon factory, 1 chicory dryer (belonging
to the joint-stock company "De danske Cikoriefabrikker"), 1 malt juice
factory, 1 iron foundry (joint-stock company, established 1899, capital
DKK 25,000; approx. 10 workers) and 1 soda factory. The town had 3
printing houses.
In Ringkøbing, 3 newspapers were published:
"Ringkjøbing Amts Avis", "Ringkjøbing Amts Dagblad" and "Ringkjøbing
Avis".
The following markets were held in Ringkøbing: 1 in
February with horses, 1 in April, 1 in June, 1 in July, 1 in August and
1 in October with horses and cattle. Torvedag was Saturday from Easter
to Michaelmas, otherwise Wednesday.
Ringkøbing Station.
From 1875, Ringkøbing got a station on the West Jutland long-distance
railway. In 1911-61, Ringkøbing Station was also the starting point for
the Ørnhøjbanen, which was extended to Holstebro in 1925.
The
distribution of the inhabitants according to means of livelihood was in
1890: 343 lived from intangible activities, 933 from crafts and
industry, 531 from trade and turnover, 109 from agriculture, 12 from
horticulture, 25 from fishing, 216 from various day laborers, 85 from
their means, 31 poverty alms, and 5 were in prison. According to a
census in 1906, the population was 2,938, of which 218 supported
themselves by non-material activities, 169 by agriculture, forestry and
dairying, 33 by fishing, 1,328 by crafts and industry, 659 by trade and
more, 247 by transport, 157 were shopkeepers, 93 lived on public support
and 34 on other or unspecified business.
In the 1900s, a shipyard
was added in company with other industry, so that industry also became
an important source of income.
The interwar period
Throughout
the interwar period, Ringkøbing's population was increasing: in 1916
3,679, in 1921 3,865, in 1925 3,863, in 1930 3,995, in 1935 4,000, in
1940 4,049 inhabitants. At the same time, two suburbs grew up, Vester
Villaby and Øster Villaby in Rindum Parish.
At the census in
1930, Ringkøbing had 3,995 inhabitants, of which 302 supported
themselves by non-material activities, 1,276 by craft and industry, 722
by trade etc., 632 by transport, 177 by agriculture, forestry and
fishing, 381 by housework, 451 were out of business and 54 had not
stated the source of income.
After the Second World War,
Ringkøbing continued its population growth. In 1945 there were 4,396
inhabitants in the market town, in 1950 4,638 inhabitants, in 1955 4,701
inhabitants, in 1960 4,869 inhabitants and in 1965 5,146 inhabitants. At
the same time, the suburbs developed, and the suburb of Heboltoft in
Velling Municipality came into being.
Municipal reform 2007
Until 2007, Ringkøbing was the capital of Ringkøbing Municipality and
Ringkøbing County. After the municipal reform (2007), the city became
part of Ringkøbing-Skjern Municipality, and Viborg became the capital of
Region Central Jutland.
1817 – 1879 Theodor Rosenørn-Teilmann – Minister of Culture and
Justice
1872 – Ludvig Mylius-Erichsen – Polar researcher
1964 -
Anders Agger - Journalist
1972 – Thomas Thorninger – ex. professional
football player
1986 – Lasse Heinze – professional footballer
(Silkeborg IF)
1989 – Jeppe Morell – professional boxer
1990 -
Trine Mulbjerg - Danish shot put record holder (16.80/Sparta AM)