Jan Pieter Minckelers (1748-1824) and the Duke of Arenberg Louis Engelbert

Statue of Jan Pieter Minckelers (1748-1824) and the Duke of Arenberg Louis Engelbert, erected in 1948 in Heverlee (Leuven), by artist Harry Elström and the architect C. Pepermans.

The sculpture consists of two bronze figures, depicted at the feet and placed on a stone pedestal. The left figure of the sculpture group represents the 'Dutch' physicist, chemist, meteorologist and pharmacist Jan Pieter Minckelers. Minckelers was born in 1748 in Maastricht in the then Austrian Netherlands. He died there on July 3, 1824. Minckelers studied at the University of Leuven and was a professor there for a while. Leuven was also the place where Minckelers made his most important discovery, that of coal gas. This gas was not only flammable, but also four times lighter than air. Minckelers, commissioned by the Duke of Arenberg Louis Engelbert, was the first to carry out a number of spectacular experiments with hot air balloons filled with the coal gas. His invention laid the scientific foundations of the zeppelin era a hundred years later.

The sculpture refers to Minckeler's first balloon experiment on November 21, 1873. The image shows Minckelers in conversation with his patron, the Duke of Arenberg. The two figures look out from their pedestal on the Kantineplein over the lawn of the Arenberg Castle, where the unmanned balloon took off on that autumn day in 1873. The unmanned aerial vehicle would land in Zichem with a record distance of 25 kilometers.

The inscription of the statue reads:

Jan Pieter Minckelers
1748-1824
Professor at the University of Leuven
inventor of coal gas
and to the Duke
Louis Engelbert d'Arenberg
nicknamed the blind duke, his patron
1750-1820
Solemn unveiling of the statue. Source: Union of Engineers from the Special Schools of the Catholic University of Leuven. LXXVth anniversary . III-IV : Golden Book, Brussels, 1950.

This statue was erected in 1948 on the occasion of the 75th anniversary of the foundation of the union of engineers from the special schools of the Catholic University of Leuven.

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