August Schmidt (trade unionist)

August Schmidt (born May 8, 1878 in Dortmund-Oespel ; † June 7, 1965 ibid) was a German trade unionist, co-founder of the mining and energy industry and its first chairman.

Life

August Schmidt was born in Oespel , a suburb of Dortmund. After attending primary school, he began to work at the Germania colliery in Marten and worked as a miner for 17 years . In 1902 he joined the SPD and was a member of the Oespel council from 1903. From 1909 to 1933 he took on leading positions in the free trade union association of miners in Germany , where he was district manager in Essen in 1909. After the beginning of the First World War he was drafted into the military and was released again in 1914 after being wounded.

Schmidt became a member of the executive board in 1918 and vice-chairman of the free miners' union in 1928. He was also an employee of the head office of the union based in Bochum . He was also a member of the Geneva International Labor Office . In addition, he was a member of the Provisional Reich Economic Council from 1922 .

After the start of National Socialist rule and the breakdown of the trade unions, Schmidt was dismissed. He was temporarily taken into " protective custody ". Between 1934 and 1938 he ran a bread shop in Barop. After that he was a miners' pensioner.

As early as May 1945, the first talks on the re-establishment of free trade unions in Dortmund took place with his significant participation. Between March 1946 and December 1946 Schmidt was chairman of the provisional Ruhr area management of the unions. He founded on 8/9. December 1946 with the industry association IV Mining British Zone, from which the IG Bergbau later emerged. He was chairman of the organization until November 1948 and then in March 1949 in the Bizone. He was also a member of the DGB's zone committee for the British zone from 1947 to 1949 . In the years after 1947 he was also a member of the German Coal Mining Management.

Between March 1949 and July 1953 Schmidt was chairman of IG Bergbau with a membership of 650,000 in 1953. After that, he was honorary chairman of the organization until his death. From 1949 to 1953 he was also a member of the executive board of the DGB.

August Schmidt died in Dortmund in 1965.

Honors

• 1953: Large Federal Cross of Merit with star and shoulder ribbon
• 1957: Freiherr vom Stein Prize
• 1958: Honorary Senator of the TU Berlin
• 1958: Honorary citizen of the city of Dortmund .

The August Schmidt Foundation is named after him . This takes care of the children of fatally injured miners and in 1974 received a one-time donation of 150,000 DM from the state government of North Rhine-Westphalia, which in this way honored Schmidt's commitment post mortem.

In Recklinghausen , a section of the southern bypass of the inner city was named after him ( August-Schmidt-Ring ). There is an August-Schmidt-Strasse in numerous cities in the Ruhr area: Bergkamen , Bönen , Dinslaken , Dortmund (university campus), Essen-Katernberg , Gladbeck , Hamm , Herten-Westerholt , Kamen , Lünen , Marl-Hüls , Mülheim an der Ruhr , Oberhausen-Osterfeld , Oer-Erkenschwick , Unna and Witten-Herbede , also in the former Aachen mining district in Alsdorf and Eschweiler .

Fonts

• Reduced. Life picture in two acts. Leipzig: Arbeiter-Theaterverlag Jahn, 1929.
• In the shadow of the gray mountains. A miner's novel from the Saar. Saarbrücken: Malstatt-Burbacher Handelsdr., 1948.
• The way was long. Bochum: Verlag der Gesellsch. IG Bergbau, 1958.

literature

• Bernd Haunfelder : North Rhine-Westphalia. Country and people 1946-2006. A biographical manual. Münster, 2006 p. 413.

Web links

• August Schmidt in the Lexicon of Westphalian Authors
• DIE ZEIT, July 30, 1953, No. 31, On August Schmidt's farewell from active service at IG Bergbau

Footnotes

1. ↑ 1228. Cabinet meeting on November 12, 1974 ( http://protocol.archive.nrw.de/ )