Matthias Hansen

Matthias Hansen (born June 10, 1892 in Hadersleben ; † December 5, 1987 ibid) was a German tobacco manufacturer and executive chairman of the umbrella organization of the German minority in Denmark .

Life

Apart from his studies and the time of the First World War, which he took part in as an officer, Matthias Hansen lived and lived in Hadersleben until his death in 1987. After returning from military service, he took over his father's tobacco factory, which was one of the city's major companies for many years.

From 1945 to 1947, Matthias Hansen was the executive chairman of the Association of German North Schleswig-Holstein, which in 1945 was the umbrella organization for the German minority in Denmark after the end of the Second World War . He was one of the fathers of the declaration of loyalty of the Hadersleben circle to the Danish people and the Danish royal family. This meant a departure from the border revision demand made by the German minority until the end of the Second World War and was thus a long-term prerequisite for reconciliation and the normalization process between the Danish and German parts of the population in Denmark. As chairman of the press committee at the time, he laid the foundation stone for the weekly newspaper Der Nordschleswiger , which was published on February 1, 1946 as the first free German newspaper in Europe and was only able to appear as a daily newspaper in 1951. After founding the German Press Association, Matthias Hansen became the first chairman of this association, an office he held until 1964.

Honors

• Federal Cross of Merit 1st class

literature

• Ernst Siegfried Hansen: Thistles on the way . Deutscher Heimat-Verlag, Bielefeld-Bethel 1957.
• Nekrolog in Deutscher Volkskalender Nordschleswig . Born in 1989.

Web links

• North Schleswig encyclopedia