Edda Schönherz

Edda Schönherz (née Staack ; born May 3, 1944 in Bad Landeck , Lower Silesia Province ) is a former German television announcer . As a victim of the SED dictatorship, she appears as a witness and was awarded the Federal Cross of Merit for her commitment to coming to terms with SED injustice .

Life

Schönherz grew up in Berlin , went to school there and initially trained as a wholesale clerk for clothing textiles. From 1966 she studied for three years at the television academy in Adlershof and trained as an announcement and television presenter with basic knowledge of journalism . With the beginning of color television in East Germany in October 1969, it became known throughout the GDR .

Schönherz did not belong to any party and was critical of the situation in the GDR. During a vacation in Budapest in August 1974, she asked the embassies of the Federal Republic and the United States about a possibility of leaving the GDR. As the embassies were under surveillance, she was arrested in Hungary a few days later without any criminal evidence. In September 1974 Edda Schönherz was brought to the pre- trial detention center of the Ministry for State Security in Berlin-Lichtenberg to “clarify a situation” and three days later he was taken from there to Berlin-Hohenschönhausen . In December, she was sentenced to three years in prison for “establishing links against the state” and “preparing to cross the border illegally in a particularly serious case” . She was taken to the notorious Hoheneck women's prison in Stollberg / Erzgebirge . After her release from prison, Edda Schönherz was supposed to work as an assistant in a large bakery in September 1977, otherwise she would be threatened with a further two and a half years of work education detention. However, she found a job as a photographer at the Catholic Church in Berlin.

Since Schönherz stuck to the exit application for herself and her children Annette and René, she was able to leave for the Federal Republic of Germany in December 1979 .

From May 1980 to 2000, Schönherz was a permanent freelancer and worked as an announcer for Bavarian TV in Munich , where she presented programs such as Carnival in Franconia together with Egon Helmhagen.

Schönherz returned to Berlin at the end of 2002 and has been guiding visitor groups through the Hohenschönhausen Memorial since 2003 as a contemporary witness officer for political education .

In 2004 Schönherz u. a. the regulars' table of the former political women from Hoheneck.

In October 2006, Schönherz was honored with the Federal Cross of Merit for her commitment to coming to terms with SED injustice by Federal President Horst Köhler .

In November 2013 , Edda Schönherz , who is active in the Association of Victims of Stalinism , founded an independent state association for Berlin-Brandenburg together with Vera Lengsfeld and Mario Röllig due to alleged financial disagreements at the top of the VOS.

publication

• The soloist. A novel by a woman who wanted to go to Germany from Germany . Verlag Edda Schönherz, Berlin 2012, ISBN 978-3-00-038562-9 .

Web links

• Edda Schönherz at the Berlin-Hohenschönhausen Memorial Foundation
• Edda Schönherz at ddr-zeitzeuge.de
• Edda Schönherz in the Internet Movie Database (English)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Spin-off. Lengsfeld founds new victims' association in Berliner Kurier on November 13, 2013