Gründerzeit (literally: “founders’ period”) was the economic phase in 19th-century Germany and Austria before the great stock market crash of 1873. Central Europe was characterized by the age of industrialization at that time. These processes together with the large influx of capital resulting from French war reparations from the Franco-Prussian War of 1870–1871, and the subsequent German Unification, led to an economic boom in Germany.
