As every year, March 8 arrives, a day declared by the UN in 1975 as International Women's Day.
Personally, since I was a child, I have lived every day of the year, every year of my life, defending equal opportunities between women and men, always seeking, in short, equity between women and men, and I know that the road is long. It requires an important cultural and social change. That women and men have to believe in it. And that women and men, always together, must walk hand in hand to achieve this precious goal.
My family history has marked my path. It is for this reason that today I have decided to tell the story of my mother, Rosmarie Dorr Wegehenkel, an extraordinary role model, a woman ahead of her time. You will see that she was not a leader, she was not even an extroverted woman. She was a discreet, persevering, quiet, curious, fair, disciplined and rigorous woman. She always fought, in silence, to achieve her challenges. And she did so by teaming up with men who considered her as their equal. With this story I want to pay her my particular and heartfelt tribute and recognition.
Absolute daughter pride!
Rosmarie Dorr Wegehenkel was born in Barcelona on August 28, 1922, the daughter of Wilhelm Dorr, a native of Iserlohn (Germany) and Lidia Wegehenkel, a native of Oporto (Portugal). Her parents arrived in Barcelona due to different circumstances arising from the 1st World War. Here they joined the German Community of Barcelona, where they met and later married.
Rosmarie was the oldest of 4 sisters. Her father was a businessman and her mother was a homemaker.
At the age of 14, in 1936, with the beginning of the Spanish Civil War, she was evacuated along with the entire German Community of Barcelona on the Italian ship "Principessa Maria" to Genoa. From there by train to Munich, Germany, where she lived until the end of 1937, when she returned to Spain, settling temporarily in San Sebastian.
In 1939, after the Spanish Civil War, he returned to Barcelona at the age of 18.
A restless and curious woman, she worked at the German Consulate during World War II. After the war, she decided to go to live in Germany, once the country had recovered from the terrible destruction suffered, in search of her national identity. There he worked in Hamburg for a while at the Venezuelan Consulate, but soon realized that he felt more from here than from there. And he returned definitively to Barcelona.
In 1953 he founded with his father "Especialidades para Industrias EPI", dedicated to the distribution in Spain of sealing products of the German multinational Carl.
Freudenberg. His duties focused on administrative support for his father.
In 1958, at the age of 35, she married Antoni Gabriel Cammany Bou, a sporty and enterprising man who worked as a salesman in the pharmaceutical industry. A late marriage for a woman of that time. But she did not take the step until she found a man who loved her, respected her and considered her an equal.
She marries and continues to work. In 3 years, between 1959 and 1961, she has three children. And she continues to work.
In 1964 her father suddenly died, and she, intelligently, asked her husband for help, with whom she also formed a new team, managing with fairness her own qualities and knowledge with those that he contributed: innate entrepreneurial spirit and an extraordinary business vision. Together they complemented each other, forming the company "EPIDOR, S.A.", starting what today, a generation later, has become the Group "EPI INDUSTRIES family of companies, S.L.". Group that integrates 16 companies, national and foreign, where almost 250 collaborators work.
In 1976, when she retired from direct work due to her fragile health, her husband, my father, dedicated a few words to her in an emotional letter of recognition. I transcribe a small excerpt that highlights the complicity, trust and respect they had for each other throughout their life together: "Rosmarie, even though your current collaboration in the company is not very tangible, it is still of incalculable value."
March 8, 2019, International Women's Day, together, women and men working side by side, we can achieve equity. We all have great references that show us the way.
Mireia Cammany Dorr
Deputy to the General Directorate of EPI INDUSTRIES family of companies, S.L.
