St. Blasien (Sankt Blasien) is a small town located in the Waldshut district in Baden-Württemberg, Germany. It is situated in the Southern Black Forest, 17 km northeast of Waldshut-Tiengen. St. Blaise's Abbey in the Black Forest is located in St. Blasien. The town is twinned with Saint-Blaise in Switzerland. It is home to the Jesuit college-preparatory school, Kolleg St. Blasien. History Abbey history The benedictine abbey, or St. Blaise's Abbey, in what is today known as St. Blasien was first mentioned in 858. The history of the city is closely tied to that of the abbey, which reached its heyday under the leadership of prince-abbot Martin Gerbert from 1764 to 1793. In 1771, Gerbert ordered the construction of the abbey's striking, classicism-style dome church based on plans by architects Pierre Michel d’Ixnard and Nicolas de Pigage and under the leadership of project manager Franz Josef Salzmann. St. Blasien abbey was secularized in 1806. The last remaining monks relocated to the St. Paul diocese in the Lavant Valley in the Alp-city Carinthia, taking with them art treasures such as the remains of 12 Habsburgs and the Cross of Adelheid. On September 26, 1808 Baden's new Grand Duke Charles Frederick ordered a review to determine whether the expensive maintenance of the dome still made sense or if the money should instead be used to build a more modest but less costly parish church. In 1809, Zurich native mechanic and inventor Johann Georg Bodmer began to establish one of the first engineering works in Germany using the former abbey buildings. After Baden found a potent financial backer in David von Eichthal, it granted the Societé St. Blaise the right to use the premises (which were now hosting a mechanical spinning factory) for the next 10 years. The company manufactured handguns, whose rawly forged components could now for the first time be processed further using specialized machines and even be produced in series. It also manufactured coining machines for the mint in Mannheim. Bodmer also ran tests with the then completely unheard of rear loading system for canons and an early version of the conveyor belt. In 1816, the factory employed 809 people and was therefore one of the focal points of early industrialism in Baden. In 1821, after Bodmer had left the company, the investor Baron David von Eichthal bought the building complex. He ordered Frenchman Benoît Fourneyron to install what was then