Rotovž Square

Yesterday an Inn, today a library

The house No. 2 on the Rotovški trg square is one of those houses almost every Maribor resident visited at least once. During the post-war times of great shortage, rice, coffee or powdered eggs, also known as Truman’s eggs, were distributed there.

Since 1960 the house No. 2 on Rotovški trg square is a home to the Maribor Public Library. Until 2010, the Puppet Theatre Maribor was located there as well, so for hundreds of youths the house was the place where they experienced (and are still experiencing) culture for the first time. The history of the house is vivid and rich, just like the contents of the books on the library shelfs. The building at Rotovški trg 2 was formed by joining two separate houses, similarly to the Rotovž Town Hall building itself. The southern house had the number 2 and the northern one the number 3. In 1930s the houses were joined together and thoroughly rebuilt and the new building was given its current address. 

The “Pri mestu Gradcu” Inn (By the city Graz)

Until the end of the 18th century the southern house with the number 2 was owned by the Vetrinjski dvor mansion, but then it was taken into the possession of Andrej Tappeiner who later became a very successful Maribor mayor and brewer. In 1834 he sold the house to Regina Vogl who was bound by the sale-purchase agreement that prevented her from selling and serving beverages at the house as well as from renting it out. When Tappeiner sold his brewery located at the nearby Glavni trg square to Franc Čeligi in 1841 and moved to Sv. Lovrenc pri Puščavi (Lovrenc na Pohorju), where he bought a glass factory, Regina Vogel concluded that the ban on selling beverages does not apply anymore and wanted to open an inn. But Čeligi, the new owner of the brewery, insisted Regina Vogel had to abide to the conditions of the agreement and won the dispute in court after a trial that lasted two years. He must have been well aware that his persistence would pay off. Since Regina Vogel was not allowed to open an inn, the house was only a financial burden to her and only a year later she sold the house to Čeligi. During the summer months, Čeligi used the cool ground-floor room with vaulted ceiling as an inn serving beer from his brewery while in during winter the inn was closed and the basement was used as a storage room.

The inn was very popular during the summer months and it was soon too small to house all the visitors so in 1861 Čeligi bought a piece of land between the house and the Rotovž Town Hall from Janez Nos (Noss), a chemist who was the owner of the Mestna lekarna pharmacy near Orl at the Glavni Trg square No. 12. In the sale-purchase agreement Nos secured easement for the passage between Lekarniška ulica street and Rotovški trg square for him and his descendants. Franc and Marija Čeligi opened the “Pri mestu Gradcu” inn (after the World War I it was renamed into the Rotovž inn) in the rebuilt and expanded house which was known among the locals simply as the Inn. Above the Inn, on the first floor of the house was a hall with a theatrical stage. Since 1861, the premises were used by the Slovanska čitalnica reading room. In Maribor, this was a period of Slovene national revival and precisely the reading room circles deserve the most credit for strengthening Slovenianess among the population. 

Billiard tables for catholic masters

In the early 1870s Čeligi decided to offer a Coffee room above the inn to his guests, so the reading room had to move out of his premises. But the locals didn’t really take to the new coffee room and it became a “regular meeting place for municipal fathers, tired after the long municipal meeting sessions”, so the coffee room was abandoned in the 1880s. The empty room above the Inn and guesthouse was rented by Katoliško društvo rokodelskih pomočnikov (Catholic Society of Artisan Apprentices) that formed into Društvo katoliških mojstrov (Society of Catholic Masters) in 1901. For its purposes, the association immediately built a new stage in the Inn, while the owner Čeligi provided his new tenants with a billiard table which, at the time, was a rare commodity in the town.

During the World War I the premises of the inn served as a place for “presenting the recruits” by the military, but after the Maister’s revolt, the premises were once again taken over by the Catholic society that occupied it before the war. On 26 February 1924, Katarina Meglica rented the house and the Catholic masters had to leave, but 2 years later the house changed owners. The new owner, the purchasing cooperative of state officials (Nabavljalna zadruga državnih uslužbencev) tore down the house and built a new building in its place, which is a southern part of Rotovški trg square No.2 today. It was used as a grocery and wholesale shop. 

They quenched their thirst at the “Pri moki” Inn

The northern house that used to have the house number 3 was built on a part of the property of Franc and Klara Aichmeier. It is evident from the Land Register from around 1830 that this was a “residential townhouse, made of bricks and with brick roofing” which also included a public fountain. The first owner of the house was Kajetan pl. Artner, an engineer of the district office, who sold it to Franc Gornik on 1 November 1832. The house was situated at a lively and busy location where judge Gornik successfully practiced his profession until 1869, when he sold his house to the spouses Schraml. Carl and Marija Schraml were not artisans, they were innkeepers. They rearranged the house into the “Pri moki” Inn which was competing for customers with the neighbouring “Pri mestu Gradcu” inn. It is interesting to note that Slovanska čitalnica reading room found a home at that inn, simmilary to how itdid at the neighbour's in the past.

“We rented the convenient rooms from Mr. Šrameln, a righteous and honest German, we bought furniture for the time being, adorned the place with suitable paintings of Slovenian and Slavic worthies in the fields of science, state and church affairs and last but not least we were also given a piano with a special help from the doctor Mr. Dominkuš and other unselfish patriots,” reminisced Professor Janez Majciger about the premises on the twentieth anniversary of the reading room in 1881. An excerpt from the Kmečke in rokodelske novice newspaper (Agricultural and Artisan News) bears witness to the fact that the premises of the reading room were a real fortress of Slovenianess/Slavism: “... look here, person from Ptuj, if you are ever interested in our cause just climb a few stairs and pass through a charming entrance to gaze upon a golden inscription “Slovanska čitavnica” (Slavic reading room). Open the door and in front of you in the spacious room you will see the commonly revered painting of Their Majesty, Our most noble Emperor and around him grand persons of Slavic lineage ...”

In the period when Slovanska čitalnica reading room was located in the “Pri moki” Inn, Slovenia’s residents started to divide politically and the initial drive and unity among the members of Slovanska čitalnica was lost. Until 1875, the premises were mainly a sanctuary for Slovenian students that visited the reading room to browse through Slovenian newspapers and magazines. Namely, their German teachers never visited the Inn that was home to Slovanska čitalnica reading room.

In 1900, the spouses Schraml sold the house to Anton Serjanec who used the house to sell wood, coal and building fixtures between 1907 and 1908, but sold the house to Helen Hawlik in 1908. Until 1913, her husband Franc used the house as a shop for mineral waters. A year later the house was bought by Maribor’s Podporna blagajna (Aushilfkassaverein, eng. Provident Fund) at an auction and immediately sold it to the regional Bolniška blagajna (Sickness Funds). The latter occupied the house until 1929 when it was bought by the Nabavljalna zadruga državnih uslužbencev (Purchasing Cooperative of State Officials), which already owned the neighbouring southern house. 

From Nabavljalna zadruga (Purchasing Cooperative) to library

The cooperative soon rebuilt the houses and joined them into a single house that we know today. After a regulation of this part of Rotovški trg square, the house was given a street number 2. The Nabavljalna zadruga državnih uslužbencev (Purchasing Cooperative of State Officials) which by 1930 had 7,000 members set up a grocery store with a modern bakery in the basement for its members. The bread and pastries were mostly baked by people from the Primorska region who were also delivering them to the members’ homes. In the house there was also a restaurant called Cankarjeva soba (Cankar’s room) where delicious local food was served and there was also a guest room on the first floor. The cooperative used the premises, which became a home to the Maribor Puppet Theatre years later, as a warehouse, and used the ground-floor premises as a textile shop. Besides the bakery, the basement was also a storage room for oil and wine, which was purchased in Dalmatia. During the German occupation of the city, Germans did not make any major changes to the building. But the food could only be bought using ration stamps and the room in the restaurant was certainly no longer named after Ivan Cankar.

For some time after the war the house was home to the shop "prodajalna s prehrambnimi predmeti" Naproza (A food items shop Neproza). Those were the post-war times of great shortage when rice, coffee or powdered eggs, known as Truman’s eggs among the locals were distributed there by ration cards. For a period of time the house was home to the Kristal glazier's shop, storage room of the Gruda company Gruda and for a while it also housed the Restaurant Dubrovnik of the Majolika restaurant company.

In the 1950s the restaurant was converted into a Red Cross canteen with the entrance from the Lekarniška ulica street. More than 400 children were daily able to obtain three hot meals at a very low price. The canteen was used by pupils of primary and secondary schools, apprentices and "commuters" from the surrounding areas, the sons and daughters of working mothers and those who resided in the city only during the workweek during schooling. The meals for the most disadvantaged children were entirely covered by the social welfare, the Slovenian Association of the Friends of Youth and the Red Cross. We should really have a similar arrangement today.