Herma Kirchschläger

Herma Kirchschläger, 1978

Herma Kirchschläger (born May 15, 1916 in Vienna ; † May 30, 2009 , born Sorger ) was the wife of the Austrian lawyer and diplomat Rudolf Kirchschläger (1915-2000) and during his tenure as Federal President from 1974 to 1986 the Austrian First Lady .

Life

Kirchschläger was born as Hermine Katharina Anna Sorger in the 5th district of Vienna Margareten . Kirchschläger had two brothers. Her older brother died in Russia during World War II ; her younger brother later took over the Erlinger 's parents' inn . Due to the food shortage that prevailed in Vienna during and after the First World War and the lack of heating means, Kirchschläger's parents decided to move to the countryside with their two younger children. They settled in Kamegg , a suburb of Gars am Kamp that is incorporated today , where they ran a restaurant . Her parents gave up an originally planned return to Vienna.

Kirchschläger attended the community school in Gars am Kamp. After graduation, she passed the entrance exam for the teacher training institute in Krems an der Donau . Despite having passed the entrance exam, Kirchschläger finally decided to continue attending school and attended the federal high school run by Piarists , the federal high school and the federal advanced high school in Horn . There she met her future husband Rudolf Kirchschläger at the age of 17. In June 1935 she graduated from there. Shortly afterwards they both made a marriage vows; However, due to the unsecured economic and financial circumstances, a marriage was not possible at that time. Herma Kirchschläger worked as a private tutor in Vienna after several applications for positions in the civil service were unsuccessful.

In August 1940 she married Rudolf Kirchschläger, then a law student. The marriage resulted in two children: daughter Christa (* 1944) and son Walter Kirchschläger (* 1947), founding rector of the University of Lucerne .

In April 1945, Herma Kirchschläger, who lived with her daughter in Kamegg, succeeded in getting her husband transferred to a replacement unit in Krumau an der Moldau through an intervention or petition ; Rudolf Kirchschläger had been wounded and had previously been housed in a hospital in Bohemia , which was later burned down by Czechoslovak freedom fighters. At the end of July 1945 the Kirchschläger family returned to Kamegg.

From 1954, after Rudolf Kirchschläger had been assigned to the Federal Chancellery , Foreign Affairs Department, Herma Kirchschläger regularly took on representative tasks. She learned foreign languages , familiarized herself with the basics of the diplomatic protocol ; Besides, she was almost alone in raising the two children. In 1967 Kirchschläger went to Prague with her husband ; he had been appointed head of mission of the Austrian legation there. In the course of the Prague Spring , Kirchschläger and her husband provided humanitarian aid for refugees at the Prague embassy. Among other things, she acquired two large freezers to have food and supplies ready for any refugees, and ensured an adequate supply of drinking water .

After Rudolf Kirchschläger's term of office as Federal President (1986) ended, Herma Kirchschläger lived with her husband in a row house in Vienna-Dornbach and in her summer villa in Rosenburg am Kamp . In 1998 she and her husband took part in the celebrations for the 80th anniversary of the founding of the Austrian Republic .

She is buried at the side of her husband in the Federal Presidential Crypt in the Vienna Central Cemetery .

social commitment

During her time as Austria's First Lady, Kirchschläger devoted herself to numerous charitable, humanitarian and social projects.

She worked on the International Committee for Voluntary Social Assistance and eventually became honorary president there . She provided intensive support to the mother and child department of Caritas Socialis in Vienna . She regularly attended meetings of the ASEAN Ladies Circle of Vienna ; Kirchschläger was particularly committed to promoting the physically and mentally handicapped. Kirchschläger was a member of the international women's organization Beta Sigma Phi .

Honors

• 1984: Grand Cross of the Order of the Infante Dom Henrique

literature

• Marco Schenz: Federal President Rudolf Kirchschläger. Böhlau, Vienna et al. 1984.
• Erich Rabl: Rudolf Kirchschläger (1915-2000), lawyer, diplomat, Foreign Minister and Federal President . In: Harald Hirz, Franz Pötscher, Erich Rabl, Thomas Winkelbauer (eds.): Waldviertler Biographien , Vol. 3, Horn (Waldviertler Heimatbund) 2010, pp. 399–428. ISBN 3-900708-26-6
• Senta Ziegler: Austria's first ladies. From Luise Renner to Margot Klestil-Löffler. Ueberreuter, Vienna 1999, pp. 61-80. ISBN 3-8000-3719-X

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b} Press release of the Presidential Chancellery of the Republic of Austria [1]