Arnulf Klett

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Arnulf Klett (left) during collective bargaining talks in 1967
Trophy donated by Arnulf Klett for a city soccer tournament in Stuttgart after the Second World War
Velcro's grave

Arnulf Klett (born April 8, 1905 in Stuttgart ; † August 14, 1974 on the Bühlerhöhe / Black Forest) was Lord Mayor of Stuttgart from 1945 to 1974 . He was the city's longest-serving mayor.

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Klett was the only child of the Protestant pastor Theodor Klett and his wife Marie Auguste. In the spring of 1923 he graduated from Dillmann-Gymnasium in the west of Stuttgart . In 1928 he received his doctorate in law from the Eberhard Karls University in Tübingen . There he joined the Igel Academic Association . From 1930 he worked as a lawyer in Stuttgart. After his death, Klett was buried in the forest cemetery in Stuttgart and left behind a son from his first marriage as well as another son and two daughters from his second marriage.

politics

The independent Klett, who was already considered a critic of the Nazi regime during the Second World War and who spent two months in the Heuberg concentration camp in 1933 , was appointed mayor of the city of Stuttgart by the French military administration in April 1945. In this function he was also a member of the provisional parliament for the state of Württemberg-Baden in 1946 . When the first free mayoral elections were due on March 7, 1948, Klett won with a clear majority; likewise in the following elections on January 10, 1954 and January 30, 1966 (the local electoral law at that time provided that mayors were elected for six years in their first term and for twelve years in up to two further terms), so that he finally up to remained in office after his death in the summer of 1974.

In 1961 he founded together with Pierre Pflimlin , the former mayor of Strasbourg , a city partnership between Stuttgart and Strasbourg. This twinning was the result of many years of efforts by Klett to improve the relationship between Germany and France. In addition, he constantly campaigned for the improvement of local public transport in Stuttgart, and it was his initiative that resulted in significant parts of today's light rail network .

Klett in the criticism

As Lord Mayor, Klett was also responsible for rebuilding the city after the Second World War. Critics accuse him of having removed the last remnants of the “old Stuttgart” by hasty demolition measures. There are very few buildings from the pre-war period in downtown Stuttgart today. In particular, the new construction of large parts of the Stuttgart City Hall and the demolition of the Kronprinzenpalais (now the Kunstmuseum Stuttgart ) are still criticized today. Large sections of the population would have preferred to rebuild the damaged buildings.

Other offices

Honors

In 1959, Klett received the Great Federal Cross of Merit with a Star. When the station forecourt was redesigned with the introduction of the Stadtbahn , the newly created square and the underground passage that connects the main train station with the city center, the underground station and the S-Bahn station were named after Arnulf Klett in 1976 as Arnulf-Klett-Platz . The cities of Kansas City and Baton Rouge have made Klett honorary citizens.

Fonts

  • Citizens, community, state , Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1948
  • Present problems and future aspects of an efficient local public transport system. Schmidt, Bielefeld 1961, ISBN 3-503-00994-9 .
  • Local economy, self-government and financial policy , Sigillum-Verlag, 1967

literature

Web links

Commons : Arnulf Klett  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ welt.de Die Welt from October 16, 1999: How Stuttgart lost its face v. Dankwart Guratzsch
personal data
SURNAME Klett, Arnulf
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German politician (independent), Member of the State Parliament, Lord Mayor of Stuttgart
DATE OF BIRTH April 8, 1905
PLACE OF BIRTH Stuttgart
DATE OF DEATH August 14, 1974
Place of death Stuttgart