# German Colombians

German Colombians (German: Deutschkolumbianer; Spanish: Germanocolombianos) are Colombian citizens of German ancestry. They may be descendants of Germans who immigrated to Colombia from Germany or elsewhere in Europe. Most German Colombians live in the departments of Andean Region and Caribbean Region. Germans have been immigrating to Colombia since at least the 16th century. During World War II, thousands of Germans fled to Colombia.

## German immigration to Colombia

The first German immigrants arrived in the 16th century contracted by the Spanish Crown, and included explorers such as Ambrosio Alfinger. There was another wave of German immigrants at the end of the 19th and beginning of 20th century including Leo Siegfried Kopp, the founder of the famous Bavaria Brewery. SCADTA, a Colombian-German air transport corporation which was established by German expatriates in 1919, was the first commercial airline in the Americas.
By the mid of the 18th century, German businessmen arrived to Barranquilla in Atlántico, and El Carmen de Bolívar, in Bolívar, with the purpose of exploiting tobacco. Most of them were from Bremen. Along with them, there were some Dutchmen, and Sephardi Jews from Curacao; however the Germans had absolute control of this business for three decades, expanding their trade quarters to biggest cities like Cartagena and Barranquilla.
In 1941, the United States government estimated that there were around 5,000 German citizens living in Colombia. Several thousand more joined their ranks in Colombia's burgeoning cities. There were some Nazi agitators in Colombia, such as Barranquilla businessman Emil Prüfert, but the majority was apolitical. Colombia asked Germans who were on the U.S. blacklist to leave and allowed Jewish refugees in the country illegally to stay.
In the 1980s, thousands of German Colombians emigrated back to West Germany due to the Colombian armed conflict. However, this trend began to decline in the late 2000s (decade) as living standards rose sharply after the Colombian economic boom.

## German immigration to Santander

German immigration was of great importance in the Santander region. From the arrival of the engineer Geo von Lengerke to the contributions to the cattle industry by Enrique and Aurelio Gast, who were outstanding cattle breeders in Santander and helped establish this region as a national reference in this industry.
Eduardo Gast, Aurelio's son, was a well-known reference and pioneer breeder of the beefmaster breed in Colombia. The recently built event center for livestock fairs and exhibitions in Socorro, Santander, was named after him in 2021 to honor his legacy and contributions to the region's cattle industry.
Augusto Gast made important contributions to the medical and scientific community in Colombia. He graduated as a surgeon from the National University of Colombia, directed the Carlos Finlay Institute for more than 12 years and was part of the National Institute of Health. His participation was definitive in establishing in Colombia the viscerotomy program for the diagnosis of yellow fever. In recognition of his merits as a researcher, Dr. Gast represented Colombia in several international conferences on yellow fever and was a reference in the Latin American epidemiological community.

## Education

German schools in Colombia:
* Deutsche Schule Bogotá
* German School of Barranquilla
* Deutsche Schule / Colegio Alemán, Cali
* Deutsche Schule Medellin

## Famous German Colombians

Source:
* Ambrosius Ehinger
* Nikolaus Federmann
* Carlos Ardila Lülle
* Rudolf Hommes
* Aura Cristina Geithner
* María Helena Doering
* Yaneth Waldman
* Sandra Eichler
* Érika Krum
* Jennifer Steffens
* Pilar Schmitt
* Helmut Bellingrodt
* Antonio Navarro Wolff
* Carlos Lemos Simmonds
* Jacquin Strouss Lucena
* Leopold Rother
* Marino Klinger
* Roberto Gerlein
* Carlos Lehder
* Augusto Gast
* Justus Schottelius
* Ernest Guhl Nimtz
* Guillermo Hoenigsberg
* Hilda Strauss
* Otto Greiffestein
* Leo Siegfried Kopp
* Alejandro Brand
* Juan Bernardo Elbers
* Jacob Benjamin Wiesner Heckerin
* Reginaldo Paschke
* Enrique Haeusler
* Otto de Greiff Haeusler
* Reginaldo Wolff
* William Wolff
* Carlos Bimberg
* Ricardo Goerke
* Guillermo Schnurbusch
* Peter Paul von Bauer
* Alfred Hettner
* Emil Grosse
* Robert Scheibe-Vater
* Gerhard Masur
* Fritz Karsen
* Franz J. Mehr
* Juan Herkath
* Hermann Halberstädter
* Edwin Graus