Editing Leverkusen (section)

== History ==
The heart of what is now Leverkusen was Wiesdorf, a village on the [[Rhine]], which dates back to the 12th century.<ref name=Braun17>{{cite book|last=Braun|first=Detlef|date=2012 |title=Leverkusen|location=Erfurt|publisher=Sutton|page=17|isbn=978-3866809703}}</ref>  With the surrounding villages which have now been incorporated, the area also includes the rivers [[Wupper]] and [[Dhünn]],<ref name=Braun6/> and has suffered a lot from flooding, notably in 1571 and 1657, the latter resulting in Wiesdorf being moved East from the river to its present location.<ref name=Braun17/>

During the [[Cologne War]], from 1583 to 1588 Leverkusen was ravaged by war. The entire area was rural until the late 19th century, when industry prompted the development that led to the city of Leverkusen, and to its becoming one of the most important centres of the German chemical industry.

The chemist [[Carl Leverkus]], looking for a place to build a [[dye]] factory, chose Wiesdorf in 1860. He built a factory for the production of artificial [[ultramarine blue]] at the Kahlberg in Wiesdorf in 1861, and called the emerging settlement "Leverkusen" after his family home in [[Lennep]]. The factory was taken over by the [[Bayer]] company in 1891; Bayer moved its headquarters to Wiesdorf in 1912. After asset confiscation at the end of the First World War, it became [[IG Farben]]. The city of Leverkusen proper was founded in 1930 by merging Wiesdorf, Schlebusch, Steinbüchel and Rheindorf, and was posthumously named for [[Carl Leverkus]].<ref name=Braun6>{{cite book|last=Braun|first=Detlef|date=2012 |title=Leverkusen|location=Erfurt|publisher=Sutton|page=6|isbn=978-3866809703}}</ref>

During the Second World War, the IG Farben factories were bombed by the [[RAF]] on 22 August 1943,<ref>[http://www.bbc.co.uk/ww2peopleswar/stories/83/a9019983.shtml WW2 People's War - A Bedfordshire Bomb Aimer - Part Two]. BBC. Retrieved on 2013-07-17.</ref> again by the RAF during [[Battle of Berlin (RAF campaign)|bombing campaigns]] on 19/20 November, the USAAF [[Eighth Air Force]] on 1 December 1943,<ref>[http://www.91stbombgroup.com/Dailies/322ndjan1943.html 322nd Dailies from 1943 - 91st Bomb Group (H)]. 91st Bomb Group. Retrieved on 2013-07-17.</ref> and finally once again by the RAF on 10/11 December 1943.

In 1975, [[Opladen]] (including Quettingen and Lützenkirchen since 1930), Hitdorf and Bergisch Neukirchen joined Leverkusen. The present city is made up of former villages, originally called Wiesdorf, Opladen, Schlebusch, Manfort, Bürrig, Hitdorf, Quettingen, Lützenkirchen, Steinbüchel, Rheindorf and Bergisch-Neukirchen.<ref name=Braun6/>

On 27 July 2021, an [[2021 Leverkusen explosion|explosion at the Chempark site]] in the city killed 7 people and injured 31 others.<ref>{{cite news |last1= |first1= |title=Explosion in Chempark Leverkusen: Investigations initiated against three employees;|url=https://www.rnd.de/panorama/explosion-im-chempark-leverkusen-mit-sieben-toten-ermittlungen-gegen-drei-mitarbeiter-eingeleitet-KWD7CMDTLZELBHL2WZHG233PEY.html |access-date=13 November 2023 |agency=RND/dpa |newspaper=RND |date=19 October 2021}}</ref>