Joseph Scherer (politician)
Joseph Scherer (born March 19, 1892 in Kobern , † April 16, 1974 in Dortmund ) was a German manager and Christian Democratic politician . From 1946 to 1962 he was Chairman of the Management Board of Signal Iduna and for twelve years he was Deputy Mayor of Dortmund .
Life
Joseph Scherer was born on March 19, 1892 in Kobern as the eldest of seven children of the winemaker Matthias Scherer and his wife Anna Scherer. The father was temporarily mayor in Kobern.
Joseph Scherer first attended elementary school and, from the age of 13, against his father's will, attended grammar school in Trier, where he graduated from high school in 1912. He then studied philosophy, literature, art history and economics in Münster and Bonn with the aim of becoming a journalist. After the outbreak of World War I, Scherer was drafted into the military and had to interrupt his studies, so that he did not take the state examination as a philologist until 1920. However, he did not seek a teaching career, but initially worked for a medium-sized professional organization in Gelsenkirchen. In 1921 he switched to the Dortmund Chamber of Crafts as a scientific assistant and took over the editing of the Westfälischer Handwerksblatt . There he made a name for himself as a financial policy expert, whereupon he was elected deputy managing director of the Chamber of Crafts. The preoccupation with professional issues led him to general politics. He joined the center and was elected as its representative in the Dortmund city council in 1933.
This membership as well as the refusal to swear in on Adolf Hitler led to dismissal from the Chamber of Crafts in the same year. Scherer then earned his living as managing director of various district guild associations before he was drafted into the Wehrmacht in 1940. He did not return from this military service until 1945.
Immediately after the Second World War, he helped found the Dortmund CDU. The personalities who prepared this foundation gathered in the Scherer circle named after him. The British military government appointed him to the Dortmund Council at the end of 1945, to which he again entered a year later in the first free elections after the war. The council members then elected him first mayor of the city, making Scherer deputy mayor Fritz Henßler . He held this office until 1956 and took it over again from 1961 to 1964. He was also a member of the First State Parliament of North Rhine-Westphalia .
Joseph Scherer was married to Anna Scherer, née Rieser. The couple had a son and a daughter together.
Joseph Scherer died on April 16, 1974 in Dortmund at the age of 82.
Services
Scherer was already committed to the health insurance companies while he was at the Dortmund Chamber of Crafts. He was one of the founding members of the "Mittelstandshilfe" mutual health insurance. Based on the model of the “craft, trade and commerce” health insurance institution a. G. zu Dortmund, this also offered health insurance to those people who did not belong to the trades, trade or trade. Scherer was appointed to the supervisory board of the Mittelstandshilfe and belonged to it until 1946. Aid to small and medium-sized businesses and the skilled trades, trade and commerce formed together with the “Signal” Unfall-Versicherungsverein a. G. an insurance group that goes back to an initiative of the Dortmund Chamber of Crafts in 1907. Scherer was elected chairman of this insurance group, now part of the Signal Iduna Group, in 1946 and remained in this position until December 31, 1962. He led the company through the difficulties that arose from the increased medical treatment costs due to the currency reform and rebuilt the company's sales network. He also introduced innovations in the field of accident insurance. After leaving the office of CEO, Scherer then became a member of the Supervisory Board of Signal Unfallversicherung a. G.
In addition to his work as chairman of the board, Scherer was also involved in association politics. So he founded the Association of private health insurances. V., of which he was a member of the board from 1950 to 1963, from 1957 as chairman. Also from 1957 to 1963 he was represented on the presidium of the General Association of the Insurance Industry . During this time he was also on the Insurance Advisory Board of the Federal Supervisory Office for Insurance and Building Societies . From 1959 he was Vice-President and from 1962 to 1969 President of the Health Insurance Working Group of the Comité Européen des Assurances . He also initiated the establishment of the working group of professionally oriented insurance companies, which he also chaired. In this capacity he was elected to the Crafts Council of the Central Association of German Crafts .
Honors
In 1952 he was appointed Knight of the Order of Knights of the Holy Sepulcher by Cardinal Grand Master Nicola Cardinal Canali and invested on May 1, 1952 by Lorenz Jaeger , Grand Prior of the German Lieutenancy ; Most recently he was its commander .
The city of Dortmund awarded Joseph Scherer the Ring of Honor in 1956 and made him an honorary citizen in 1966 because of his exceptional service in the reconstruction of the city . In addition, a street near the Signal Iduna headquarters in Dortmund is named after Scherer.
The Central Association of German Crafts honored him in 1957 with the gold craft mark.
In 1960, Joseph Scherer received the Federal Cross of Merit from Federal President Heinrich Lübke .
literature
- Heinrich Frommknecht: Scherer, Joseph . In: Hans Bohrmann (Ed.): Biographies of important Dortmunders. People in, from and for Dortmund . tape 3 . Klartext, Essen 2001, ISBN 3-88474-954-4 , p. 165 ff .
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c Heinrich Frommknecht: Scherer, Joseph . In: Hans Bohrmann (Ed.): Biographies of important Dortmunders. People in, from and for Dortmund . tape 3 . Klartext, Essen 2001, ISBN 3-88474-954-4 , p. 165 ff .
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Scherer, Joseph |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | German manager and politician |
| DATE OF BIRTH | March 19, 1892 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Kobern |
| DATE OF DEATH | April 16, 1974 |
| Place of death | Dortmund |