Alfred Kober

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Alfred Kober-Staehelin (born February 26, 1885 in Basel ; † April 3, 1963 ibid), pseudonym Salander , was a Swiss publisher and journalist .

Live and act

Alfred Kober-Stähelin (1885–1963) Dr. jur., book publisher, journalist, pacifist, grave in the Wolfgottesacker cemetery, Basel
Grave in the Wolfgottesacker cemetery , Basel
Family grave: Stähelin-Clemens-Stockmayer-Kracht-Kober-Pfeifer-Schwabe-Jucker
Family grave in the Wolfgottesacker cemetery , Basel

Alfred Kober was born in 1885 as the son of the publisher Paul Kober and Maria Gobat. His grandfather was the evangelical bishop of Jerusalem, Samuel Gobat . Kober's father, who had taken over the Kober'sche Verlagbuchhandlung in Basel founded by his great-uncle in 1897, died a year later, in 1898, when the son was only thirteen years old, on a trip to Palestine . After schooling studied Kober law , in 1908 he graduated as Dr. jur.

In 1908 Kober married Anna Staehelin, a daughter of the theologian and church historian Rudolf Stähelin-Stockmeyer . In the same year, Kober took over the Kober'sche publishing bookshop in Basel, which his mother had run since his father's death. The focus of the activities of this publishing house was the publication of the works of the philosopher Joseph Anton Schneiderfranken , Bô Yin Râ, who also had a strong personal impact on Kober.

In the 1930s, Kober turned to journalism . From 1933 to 1945, Kober, a staunch opponent of German National Socialism and Italian fascism, published three to five foreign policy articles and glosses a week in the National-Zeitung in which he took a stand against these systems and their policies. According to the Historical Lexicon of Switzerland , Kober, with his so-called co-editorials, was one of the “formative critics of National Socialism” in the European newspaper landscape during the Second World War. In 1952 he was awarded the King's Medal for Service in the Cause of Freedom for his services in this field.

In addition, Kober was particularly committed to supporting political emigrants from Germany. For example, he was in contact with Thomas and Klaus Mann and with the escaped SD agent Heinrich Pfeifer , who married Kober's daughter Elsbeth after the war.

After the war, Kober founded the Catholic-social weekly newspaper Der Weg . He worked as a journalist for the National-Zeitung until 1960. Politically, he turned against the escalation of the Cold War . He also turned against the negligent persecution and the return of former National Socialists to leading political, economic and social positions in the young Federal Republic: On December 12, 1958, Kober complained in a gloss:

"It seems that in the West German Federal Republic the incorrigible fighters and beneficiaries of Hitler's criminal regime think the time is ripe again to get out of their loopholes."

Kober's estate is now in the Swiss Federal Archives (BAR) .

Fonts

  • Paul Kober-Gobat (1842–1898). In: The Evangelical Book Trade: Building Blocks for Its History. Wallmann, Leipzig 1921.
  • My position on Bô Yin Râ. Kober, Basel / Leipzig 1930 ( pamphlets from the Kober'sche publishing house bookstore. No. 5).
  • Why Bô Yin Râ? Kober, Basel / Leipzig 1931 ( pamphlets of the Kober'sche publishing house bookstore. No. 6).

literature

  • Hans Girsberger: Who's Who in Switzerland. Including the Principality of Liechtenstein. , 1963, p. 244.
  • Basel News . , April 4, 1963.
  • We bridge builders . , May 1, 1985.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Georg Kreis : July 1940: The Trump action. Helbing and Lichtenhahn, Basel / Stuttgart 1973, ISBN 3-7190-0618-2 , p. 60.
  2. ↑ Peter de Mendelssohn: Thomas Mann. Diaries. Vol. 3, p. 468.
  3. ↑ Roth: The Security Service of the SS and June 30, 1934. P. 28.
personal data
SURNAME Kober, Alfred
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Kober-Staehelin, Alfred (full name); Salander (pseudonym)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Swiss publisher and journalist
DATE OF BIRTH February 26, 1885
PLACE OF BIRTH Basel
DATE OF DEATH April 3, 1963
Place of death Basel