Harald Oldag

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Harald Oldag (born August 11, 1899 in Meißen , † June 16, 1972 in Rimsting ) was a German journalist .

Life

Youth and First World War

Oldag was the son of the doctor Rudolf Oldag and his wife Frieda, nee Bär. In his youth he attended elementary school , a secondary school and the Royal Saxon Princely and State School St. Afra in Meissen .

In May 1917, Oldag was drafted into the Saxon Army, where he joined the Royal Saxon Infantry Regiment No. 182 in Freiberg . He passed his matriculation examination while on vacation in February 1918. He was then sent to the Romanian theater of war in March 1918, before taking part in the advance into the Ukraine to Ciskaucasia . In July 1918, Oldag was sent to Döberitz to attend an officers' course . In November 1918 he was surprised by the revolution on his way to the Western Front . In May 1919, he left the army as an ensign .

Weimar Republic

In 1919 Oldag began studying medicine . After a short time, however, he changed his field of study in order to devote himself to studying philosophy , philology and art history , which he completed at the universities of Leipzig and Munich. In 1923/1924 Oldag obtained his doctorate with a thesis supervised by Artur Kutscher on the professional song of the German soldier during the First World War - which he wrote "Dem Gedächtnis Albert des Schlageter", d. H. dedicated to Albert Leo Schlageter , who had been executed shortly before by the French for espionage and explosive attacks - as Dr. phil. (oral examination on March 8, 1923, printed in June 1924). During his studies in 1919 he became a member of the Leipzig fraternity Dresdensia . He was also active in the German student body . He also participated in the establishment of the German-style university ring .

In the post-war period, Oldag initially became politically active in the Young German Order . From 1925 to 1933 he was a member of the Front Soldiers' Association Stahlhelm .

After completing his studies, Oldag became secretary to the leader of the Anti-Bolshevik League for the Protection of German Culture , Eduard Stadtler, in February 1923 . In October 1923 he got a position as editor at the Deutsche Zeitung in Berlin. In October 1924 he switched to the Bergisch-Märkische Zeitung in Elberfeld as foreign policy editor .

In 1927 Oldag became the editor of Münchner Neuesten Nachrichten , from which he was removed after three months - allegedly for political reasons. From November 1, 1928, he headed the Berlin editorial office of the Dresdner Nachrichten .

On January 1, 1933, Oldag became the main editor of the Saale-Zeitung in Halle (Saale) . He held this position until 1938. In addition, he was on the staff of the Stahlhelm Regional Leader Max Jüttner .

Post-war period and the Bonn Republic

After the Second World War, Oldag was initially deputy editor-in-chief of the Evangelical Press Service (epd). In 1955 he switched to the service of the Federal Press Office in Bonn. In this he took over the management of Department I (Current Information), making him the third man in the office after the Federal Press Chief and his deputy. At that time he was also known as the “federal smile” among Bonn's capital city journalists.

Oldag caused a stir in 1956 when, together with Otto Thieme, he made preparations for the establishment of a charitable foundation known as the George Bähr Foundation , which aimed to raise funds around the world for the implementation of projects aimed at promoting the restoration of German unity . The Saxony area was intended to be the focus of their activities. In addition to the financing of scholarships for students from Saxony in West Germany, among other things the reconstruction of the Dresden Frauenkirche , designed by the name division of the George Bähr Foundation , was to be financed. The project finally failed because the budgeted funds were needed for the federal election campaign of 1957.

Fonts

  • The professional song of the German soldier from 1914 to 1918. Study of the relationship between the soldier's profession and the soldier's song , dissertation at the University of Munich 1923.

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Date and place of death according to Rainer Orth : The official seat of the opposition. Politics and state restructuring plans in the office of the Deputy Chancellor 1933/1934, Cologne 2016, p. 660.
  2. ↑ Willy Nolte (Ed.): Burschenschafter Stammrolle. List of the members of the German Burschenschaft according to the status of the summer semester 1934. Berlin 1934. p. 359.
  3. ↑ [1]
  4. ^ The Cabinet Minutes of the Federal Government: Minutes of the 82nd Cabinet meeting on May 18, 1955
  5. ↑ Chancellor's vacation. Ear to the heater . In: Der Spiegel . No. 14 , 1956, pp. 13-14 ( online ).
  6. ↑ Soviet Zone Aid. Lenz should do it . In: Der Spiegel . No. 25 , 1956, pp. 11-12 ( online ).
personal data
SURNAME Oldag, Harald
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German journalist
DATE OF BIRTH August 11, 1899
PLACE OF BIRTH Meissen
DATE OF DEATH June 16, 1972
Place of death Rimsting