Picture telegraph

The Bild-Telegraf was an Austrian tabloid that was fought over, renamed and finally discontinued as part of the Vienna Newspaper War.

The newspaper was founded on April 3, 1954 by three representatives of local Austrian daily newspapers. It was supposed to be an independent, nationwide publication, competing with the Viennese tabloid Kurier (then: Neuer Kurier ). The founders were Gustav Canaval from Salzburger Nachrichten , Hans Behrmann from Oberösterreichische Nachrichten and Joseph Moser from the Tiroler Tageszeitung .

As editor in chief was Gerd Bacher , the then 28-year-old local leader of the Salzburger Nachrichten , used already as a 21-year-old in the founding of Salzburger Volkszeitung was involved.

The newspaper made the new courier of Ludwig Polsterer actually soon large competitors. Because of the mutual competition, both newspapers were in a very bad financial position in the mid-1950s.

From 1955 the newspaper was printed in the renowned Viennese press house on Fleischmarkt , which at the time was leased by the newspaper maker Fritz Molden ( Die Presse ). A far-reaching clause was built into the printing contract: As soon as the debt of the Bild-Telegraph to Fritz Molden exceeds two million schillings, Molden is allowed to publish a “similar newspaper”.

On March 12, 1958, the time had come. Fritz Molden filed for bankruptcy against the newspaper and took over the entire editorial department of the Bild-Telegraph in order to publish the Bildtelegramm newspaper with it , which was completely similar to the Bild-Telegraph both in appearance and content.

As a result, the newspaper Bild-Telegraf did not appear for a few days. The managing director Hans Behrmann finally ran the newspaper with courier chief Ludwig Polsterer and the support of the regional party leader of the Austrian People's Party (ÖVP) , Fritz Polcar . It was produced from March 17, 1958 by the editorial team of the Kurier under editor-in-chief Hans Dichand .

With headlines like A scandal without example - Bild-Telegraf stolen! From today we are back! (March 17, 1958) an attempt was made to discredit the opponent and to reassert its own position on the market.

The editorial team managed to produce two newspapers at once until July 23, 1958. Then the Bild-Telegraf stopped its publication without replacement.