Magyar Posta is marking the 150th anniversary of the birth of Gedeon Richter by issuing a special stamp. The new issue designed by the graphic artist Zsuzsanna Czirják-Nagy was produced by ANY Security Printing Company, and will be available at first day post offices and Filaposta in Hungary and may also be ordered from Magyar Posta’s online store from 1 July 2022.
Gedeon Richter (1872-1944) was a Hungarian pharmacist and the founder of the modern Hungarian pharmaceutical industry. After the death of his parents, he was brought up in Gyöngyös, where he became an apprentice pharmacist in 1890. In 1895, he obtained a degree in pharmacy from the University of Budapest. Two years later, he travelled abroad and studied pharmaceutical production methods in several European pharmacies. In 1901, he bought the Eagle Pharmacy on the corner of Üllői Street and Márton Street in Budapest, establishing his own company and laying the foundations for pharmaceutical production in Hungary. In 1907, he built the first pharmaceutical factory in Hungary at 63 Cserkesz Street in Kőbánya, Budapest, which he ran as the chief executive. The factory’s success is demonstrated by the fact that it had already been granted 24 patents for medicines by the outbreak of the First World War. By the beginning of the Second World War, the factory had a network of representatives on five continents and 10 subsidiaries. In 1942, Richter was stripped of his position as chief executive and banned from the factory under the Jewish laws. From then on, through his trusted associates, Richter illegally managed the company from his home. In the autumn of 1944, the operation of the factory ground almost to a complete halt. At that time Richter had the chance to leave for Switzerland, but he refused to abandon his country and his company. On 30 December 1944, Gedeon Richter became a victim of the Arrow Cross regime, and was executed along with many other of his Jewish compatriots on the banks of the Danube.
The stamp features a portrait and the signature of Gedeon Richter, as well as the former factory building in Cserkesz Street. The Richter Gedeon Chemical Research and Office Building, which won the Budapest Architectural Award (designed by Gábor Zoboki, Éva Oláh and Zoltán Tóth of Zoboki Design and Architecture), appears on the commemorative first day cover. Photos by Gábor Bodó.
