Franz Burda

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Aenne & Franz Burda II. (1931)

Franz Burda senior ( sen. , And "II." * 24. February 1903 in the Philippsburg ; † thirtieth September 1986 in Offenburg ) was a German publisher and founder of the Burda publishing house (now Hubert Burda Media ). He led his company, which began as a small printing company, to success and became one of the most successful German media entrepreneurs after the Second World War . He is thus an important figure in the reconstruction of the Federal Republic of Germany.

life and work

Family, school and university education

Franz Burda II. Was the first son of Franz Burda I (1873–1929), who had operated a small print shop from 1903 first in Philippsburg, from 1908 in Offenburg, and in 1927 based on the name of Süddeutsche Rundfunk AG (SÜRAG) The magazine Die Sürag published, which was called the big radio magazine in the subtitle . Franz Burda I married the widowed Josefine Pröttel, née Mauck , in 1902 , who was the wife of Otto Pröttel, who died in 1901; in 1898 he had employed Franz Burda I. at the Philippsburger Zeitung . After Pröttel's death, Franz Burda I took over the business, which, however, could not be maintained economically. In 1908, the family therefore moved to Offenburg, where Franz Burda reopened a printing company.

His son Franz II passed the Abitur in March 1921 at what was then the Oberrealschule , today's Schiller Gymnasium in Offenburg. For economic reasons he could not study at first and took up a commercial apprenticeship. After years of study, which he spent from 1923 at the Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg , in Munich, Vienna and Erlangen, he passed his state examination in 1926, thereby earning a diploma in economics. He received his doctorate in 1928 at the University of Erlangen with a work on economic history on the development of the Baden product exchange . The rigorosum and the publication of his work had already taken place in the previous year.

Start of business activity, marriage

He did not pursue an academic career, but in 1926, even before writing his dissertation , joined his father's print shop, who had health problems and was therefore unable to continue the business on his own. The radio magazine Die Sürag flourished: its volume increased from 8 to 64 pages by 1935, when its production was switched to the then still rare gravure printing process , and in the early 1930s it reached a circulation of 60,000, then over 85,000 copies. At that time the company employed around 100 people. Franz Burda had become a "successful small business owner".

Franz Burda I died in 1929; in the same year his son met Anna Magdalena Lemminger, who later became Aenne Burda . The couple married on June 9, 1931. Together they had three sons, Franz (* May 24, 1932 - January 17, 2017), Frieder (* April 29, 1936 - July 14, 2019) and Hubert Burda (* February 9, 1940). The daughter Renate (* 1941) emerged from the relationship with his secretary Elfie Breuer. In 1929 Burda had passed the journeyman's examination as a book printer , in 1930 his master’s examination. In the same year he was a candidate for the economic party in the Offenburg municipal council elections .

time of the nationalsocialism

As early as 1933 Burda boasted in the Sürag that it had no Jewish employees or shareholders and emphasized the newspaper's National Socialist sentiments . From 1934 to 1937 he was a member of the National Socialist Motor Corps (NSKK). After an apolitical dispute, his membership was terminated. On October 1, 1938, Burda joined the National Socialist German Workers' Party (NSDAP). In 1938 he profited from Aryanization when he and the owner of Südwestdruck Karlsruhe, Karl Fritz , “took over” one of the most modern and largest printing works in Germany from the Jewish Reiss brothers in Mannheim ( Gebrüder Bauer oHG ) who were forced to sell . Fritz and Burda bought the company for 800,000 Reichsmarks (RM). Franz Burda first moved to Heidelberg to be closer to the new Mannheim company, several times a week he continued his business in Offenburg. In the course of the air raids on Mannheim , operations were relocated to Lahr- Dinglingen and from 1941 Burda lived in Offenburg again. The Mannheim company buildings were completely destroyed by air raids by the Allies in 1944. Of the three brothers Reiss just Berthold Reiss survived the era of National Socialism , he was in 1948, after the currency reform , Burda with a total of 443,000 German marks compensated.

In order to avoid the threat of military service by making it indispensable , Burda initially offered Daimler-Benz the manufacture of tank engine parts after the start of the Second World War . After this failed, he sought contact with the Wehrmacht High Command , offered to print maps and founded the Cartographic Institute Dr. Franz Burda , which went to the Ernst-Klett-Verlag in Stuttgart in 1951 . From then on she produced maps for Erwin Rommel and aerial photo plans for the Wehrmacht, so that Burda did not have to do any military service due to this important military activity. He only turned down an offer to take over the management of all printing works in the occupied territories after his wife protested. Burda's personal income, which had risen from 10,200 Reichsmarks in 1933 to RM 56,000 in 1938, increased again after a decline in 1939, only to decline “considerably” in the penultimate year of the war, as a result of the printing of the “Gaubrief” of the German Labor Front Baden. At the end of the war he escaped being called up for the Volkssturm because he was commissioned by SS man Gunter d'Alquen to print National Socialist leaflets that were to be brought across the French border.

The journalist Peter Köpf described Burda, whose business "prospered" during the National Socialism, in 2002 as an "accomplice", for whom business success counted above all. The Badische Zeitung came to a similar assessment in 2015 and classified him, citing the sources of the Offenburg city ​​archive, as a follower of National Socialism. In the main, he represented the interests of his company. His son Hubert Burda judged: “My father might have stumbled into National Socialism; but not because he was a Nazi, but because he figured he had good chances as an entrepreneur. ”On the other hand, in connection with the Ludwig Zind affair , at the end of the 1950s , Burda expressed his“ incomprehension ”about the anti-Semitic remarks made by Zind were covered in the press, and Zind was employed in his company after he was expelled from school.

post war period

Franz Burda II. (Left) with Romy Schneider , Willy Brandt and Ilona Grübel (1971)

Until the establishment of the Federal Republic of Germany in 1949 Offenburg was in the French occupation zone . In November 1945, the French major general Jacques-Fernand Schwartz, in his capacity as military governor of Baden Burda, whom he classified as a “staunch supporter of Hitler”, initially wanted to “remove him from the management of his company”. In May, Burda had been detained for five days on the orders of Colonel Sayous, whom he opposed.

However, despite his former membership in the NSDAP, Burda was allowed to return to business very quickly immediately after the end of the war, when his company was initially confiscated: for the French occupation authorities, he first printed postage stamps, school books, maps, pamphlets and the troop newspaper Revue d'information . His business flourished and in 1946 it was the second largest in Offenburg with 182 employees. Against the resistance of many French officers, he succeeded in 1948 to work again as a publisher, he brought the illustrated magazine Das Ufer (the forerunner of Bunte ) on the market. It helped him that he was friends with the officer and German specialist Raymond Schmittlein and that the license was issued in the name of a straw woman who was familiar with him . Only when the license requirement ended in 1949 did Franz Burda act as publisher, and Sürag also appeared again. In the year after the currency reform of 1948 , his company's turnover was already 7.5 million marks. In 1949 Aenne Burda succeeded in laying the foundation for her career as a publisher; this with the start of the publication of the magazine Favorit , the forerunner of Burda Moden .

Franz Burda never revised his political stance in the 1930s. In 1969, as the editor of an illustrated book on the Apollo 11 mission, he made uncritically in common with the rocket researcher Wernher von Braun, who was known for his National Socialist past .

Burda, who was often called “the Senator”, was considered, internally as well, as an old-style patriarch . A former works council chairman, Kurt Henninger, even described him as a "living Lord God". In the later years of his life, Burda tended to glorify his past and recount anecdotes from his life in a smug way. Regardless, however, he was an important figure in the post-World War II reconstruction . Trade unions had a difficult time in his company, but he always felt obliged to this and his employees. For example, he set up a company health insurance and a pension fund.

Others

Burda acted as a patron of the arts , donated the Burda Prize for Fine Arts and financially supported several mountaineering expeditions in which Reinhold Messner was involved, such as the Sigi Löw commemorative expedition to Nanga Parbat , for which he secured the exclusive rights to report.

Awards

literature

  • Peter Köpf : The Burdas . 1st edition. Europa Verlag Berlin , Hamburg 2002, ISBN 3-203-79145-5 .
  • Dr. Franz Burda - man and work. A font for his 60th birthday on February 24, 1963. Text: Oswald Scharfenberg. Burda, Offenburg 1963 (Festschrift).

Web links

Commons : Franz Burda  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Zeit.de November 26, 1982: Power and Splendor of Colorful Pictures (June 25, 2016)
  2. ↑ Peter Köpf: The Burdas . 1st edition. Europa Verlag Berlin, Hamburg 2002, ISBN 3-203-79145-5 , p. 16 f .
  3. ↑ Peter Köpf: The Burdas . 1st edition. Europa Verlag Berlin, Hamburg 2002, ISBN 3-203-79145-5 , p. 22-28, 306 .
  4. ↑ Peter Köpf: The Burdas . 1st edition. Europa Verlag Berlin, Hamburg 2002, ISBN 3-203-79145-5 , p. 29-33 .
  5. ↑ a b c “The injustice of the Aryanization remains”. In: Badische Zeitung, print edition. February 25, 2015, accessed June 27, 2016 .
  6. ↑ Peter Köpf: The Burdas . 1st edition. Europa Verlag Berlin, Hamburg 2002, ISBN 3-203-79145-5 , p. 31 .
  7. ↑ a b Peter Köpf: The Burdas . 1st edition. Europa Verlag Berlin, Hamburg 2002, ISBN 3-203-79145-5 , p. 306 .
  8. ↑ http://www.fembio.org/biographie.php/frau/biographie/aenne-burda/#biografie , accessed on July 3, 2019
  9. ↑ a b c d e f Peter Köpf : The glorious Franz. In: the daily newspaper , February 22, 2003, accessed on August 8, 2016.
  10. ↑ Peter Köpf: The Burdas . 1st edition. Europa Verlag Berlin, Hamburg 2002, ISBN 3-203-79145-5 , p. 36, 47 .
  11. ↑ An explorer of life. Frankfurter Rundschau , November 3, 2006.
  12. ↑ Peter Köpf: The Burdas . Europa Verlag Berlin, Hamburg 2002, ISBN 3-203-79145-5 , p. 46 f., 71 .
  13. ^ Joachim Neumann: The publishing house "Astra" Josef Penygey-Szabó in Lahr / Baden. P. 311.
  14. ↑ Peter Köpf: The Burdas . Europa Verlag Berlin, Hamburg 2002, ISBN 3-203-79145-5 , p. 52 .
  15. ↑ Peter Köpf: The Burdas . Europa Verlag Berlin, Hamburg 2002, ISBN 3-203-79145-5 , p. 53 f .
  16. ↑ Peter Köpf: The Burdas . Europa Verlag Berlin, Hamburg 2002, ISBN 3-203-79145-5 , p. 42 .
  17. ^ Andreas Lörcher: Anti-Semitism in the public debate of the late fifties. Microhistorical study and discourse analysis of the Zind case. Dissertation. University of Freiburg i. Br. 2008 ( full text ), p. 158.
  18. ↑ Schwartz, Jacques-Fernand. Retrieved August 9, 2016 .
  19. ↑ Peter Köpf: The Burdas . Europa Verlag Berlin, Hamburg 2002, ISBN 3-203-79145-5 , p. 64 f .
  20. ↑ In the cell for criminals. In: Baden Online from May 2, 2013, accessed on August 9, 2016.
  21. ↑ Peter Köpf: The Burdas . Europa Verlag Berlin, Hamburg 2002, ISBN 3-203-79145-5 , p. 57 .
  22. ↑ Peter Köpf: The Burdas . Europa Verlag Berlin, Hamburg 2002, ISBN 3-203-79145-5 , p. 58 .
  23. ↑ Peter Köpf: The Burdas . Europa Verlag Berlin, Hamburg 2002, ISBN 3-203-79145-5 , p. 90- .
  24. ↑ http://www.fembio.org/biographie.php/frau/biographie/aenne-burda/#biografie , accessed on July 3, 2019
  25. ↑ Flug zum Mond a documentation and illustrated book from Burda Verlag with a foreword by Wernher von Braun. by Dr. Franz Burda: Offenburg 978-3-77510764-8 cardboard tape - Lausitzer Buchversand. Retrieved August 3, 2019 .
  26. ↑ Bunte editor Oswald Scharfenberg 1968: "He's the patriarch - and that's a good thing." In: Peter Köpf: Die Burdas . Europa Verlag Berlin, Hamburg 2002, ISBN 3-203-79145-5 , p. 11 .
  27. ↑ Peter Köpf: The Burdas . Europa Verlag Berlin, Hamburg 2002, ISBN 3-203-79145-5 , p. 13-28 .
  28. ^ Fritz-Peter Linden: Jacques Berndorf - viewed from the Eifel . KBV Verlags- & Medien GmbH, Hillesheim 2013, ISBN 978-3-95441-080-4 , p. 57 ( limited preview in Google Book search).
  29. ↑ Gunhild Freese: publisher and patron. In: Zeitmagazin . October 3, 1986. Retrieved July 23, 2016 .
  30. ↑ Stefan Winterbauer: Hubert Burda celebrated with "Beckmann". In: Meedia . February 9, 2010, accessed July 23, 2016 .
  31. ↑ Like a fourth son to him. In: Baden Online . September 24, 2011, accessed July 23, 2016 .
  32. ↑ Peter Köpf: The Burdas . 1st edition. Europa Verlag Berlin, Hamburg 2002, ISBN 3-203-79145-5 , p. 9 .
  33. ^ City of Philippsburg: Honorary Citizen , accessed on June 28, 2016
  34. ↑ Zeit.de , November 26, 1982: Power and Splendor of Colorful Pictures , accessed on June 28, 2016
  35. ↑ List of all decorations awarded by the Federal President for services to the Republic of Austria from 1952 (PDF; 6.9 MB)
  36. ↑ Kurbetrieb Menzenschwand GmbH (ed.): Menzenschwand on the way to the radon spa. A documentation of the drafts, development measures and plans. Burda, Offenburg 1973, p. 9f.
  37. ↑ Announcement of awards of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany. In: Federal Gazette . Vol. 25, No. 111, June 16, 1973.
personal data
SURNAME Burda, Franz
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German publisher and founder of the Burda publishing house
DATE OF BIRTH February 24, 1903
PLACE OF BIRTH Philippsburg
DATE OF DEATH September 30, 1986
Place of death Offenburg