Sankt Michael in Upper Styria

market community Sankt Michael in Upper Styria
coat of arms	Austria map
Basic data
Country:	Austria
State :	Styria
Political District :	Leoben
License plate :	LN
Surface:	56.02 km²
Coordinates :	47 ° 20 '  N , 15 ° 1'  E Coordinates: 47 ° 20 '19 "  N , 15 ° 1' 6"  E
Height :	596  m above sea level A.
Residents :	3,045 (January 1, 2020)
Postcodes :	8713, 8770
Area code :	03843
Community code :	6 11 13
Address of the municipal administration:	Hauptstrasse 64 8770 Sankt Michael in Obersteiermark
Website:	www.gemeinde-stmichael.at/
politics
Mayor :	Karl Fadinger ( SPÖ )
Municipal Council : (2015) (21 members)	13 4th 3 1 13 4th 3 1  A total of 21 seats SPÖ : 13 ÖVP : 4 FPÖ : 3 KPÖ : 1
Location of Sankt Michael in Upper Styria in the Leoben district
Sankt Michael in Obersteiermark from the south
Source: Municipal data from Statistics Austria

St. Michael in Obersteiermark is a market town in the judicial district or district of Leoben in Upper Styria in Austria with 3045 inhabitants (as of January 1, 2020).

geography

The municipality has an area of ​​56.02 km² and is at an altitude of 596 m.

Community structure

The municipality includes the following seven localities (population in brackets as of January 1, 2020):

• Well (23)
• Greith (23)
• Hinterlainsach (44) including Lochitz
• Jassing (28)
• Liesingtal (1795) including Aiching
• Sankt Michael in Obersteiermark (990) including alluvial forest
• Vorderlainsach (142)

The community consists of the cadastral communities Brunn, Hinterlainsach, Jassing, Liesingthal, St. Michael in Upper Styria and Vorderlainsach.

Neighboring communities

	Traboch	Sankt Peter-Freienstein Leoben
Sankt Stefan ob Leoben		Übelbach ( Graz area )

history

Early, ancient and medieval times

The first residents of St. Michael were most likely Celts and Illyrians . Later the Romans also settled the area, which is proven by a fibula from the 2nd or 3rd century found in the Vorderlainsach . At the time of the Great Migration, the Avars moved through the place, followed by Slavic tribes (Croats and Slovenes) who carried out the first clearing. In the middle of the 8th century, Christianization began by the Bavarians , who especially venerated the Archangel Michael. It can be assumed that they gave the first church and thus the place its name. The Walpurgis Church was built around 1170 and today, with its admirable glass windows, is one of the three earliest Gothic works in Styria. In 1187 the parish with its 17 branch churches came to Admont Abbey .

15th to 19th century

Huge swarms of locusts destroyed the entire harvest in 1478 and in 1480 the Turks marched through the village, pillaging; In 1532, when Christian auxiliary troops from Spain and Italy marched through from Vienna, the place burned again. St. Michael was also repeatedly ravaged by the plague . After a flood in 1740 that killed 32 people, and after a severe earthquake in 1794, the French marched through the town four times: 1797, 1801, 1805 and 1809. On May 25, 1809, there was a battle near the Walpurgis Church, where a monument still testifies to this battle today, a defeat of the Austrians, which cleared the way for the French to the Semmering ( battle of St. Michael ) .

In 1850, when the place already had 1,700 inhabitants, St. Michael also became a political municipality. In 1861 the place got a post office.

Postmark from St. Michael ob Leoben, 1883

In 1868 the station was built on the newly built Rudolfsbahn and in 1879 a municipal office was built, where a gendarmerie post was also set up. The newly built elementary school opened in 1885 .

From 1874 an ironworks was operated that employed up to 1000 workers. This company was converted into an enamel factory in 1889 and closed in 1902.

20th century until today

In December 1914, up to 2,200 refugees, mostly Ruthenians from Galicia , were housed in the empty halls , many of whom fell victim to a typhus epidemic and were buried in the cemetery named after them. In 1915 the k. u. k. Reserve hospital, which included the elementary school and 24 barracks. In the same year, the Heroes' Cemetery was inaugurated.

In 1916, recovered soldiers erected a war memorial on Annaberg, which is also shown in stylized form on the municipal coat of arms. At the end of the First World War , returning troops looted the place. In 1945, immediately after the Second World War, the Russian Red Army occupied the place, which also resulted in numerous looting.

In 1964 the first lessons took place in the newly built secondary school .

In 1978 the Gleinalm tunnel was opened to traffic in the course of the expansion of the Pyhrn Autobahn A 9 . The St. Michael barracks were opened in 1980.

A new center of community life, the Volkshaus, was opened in 1982. After more than 1000 years with the status of a village, St. Michael was raised to market in 1983. In 1989 the sewage treatment plant Unteres Liesingtal was opened.

In 1994 the new local branch of the Red Cross was opened. In 1995 the new waste material collection center was opened and an extension to the elementary school was handed over.

In October 2009 a new parish hall was opened.

politics

Community representation

The council consists of a total of 21 members, 4 of whom belong to the council.

In 2010, 14 of the municipal councils belong to the SPÖ , 3 to the ÖVP , 3 to the FPÖ and 1 to the Greens .

Community Board:

• Mayor Karl Fadinger (SPÖ)
• 1st Vice Mayor Barbara Gamsjäger (SPÖ)
• 2nd Vice Mayor Gerhard Jöchlinger (ÖVP)
• Municipal treasurer Josef Schwarzenbacher (SPÖ)

badges and flags

The parish of St. Michael did not have a coat of arms until the first third of the 20th century. But in 1935, the local council under Mayor L. Schaffer asked for a community seal with a coat of arms to be used. Based on the church St. Michael legend and the place name, a fist armed with a sword and an ornament with a cross symbol were attached to the war memorial created on the Annaberg in 1915. This monument became the model for the community seal.

In 1954, the heraldists initiated a redesign of the old coat of arms in the state government. By resolution of December 28, 1955, the municipality of Sankt Michael was granted the right to use the municipal coat of arms with effect from February 1, 1956. The solemn conferment of this right and the handing over of the heraldic certificate took place in a ceremony on September 27, 1956 by the district captain, Oberregierungsrat Dr. Pfaller.

The municipality flag has three stripes in blue, white and yellow with the coat of arms.

Regional policy

Sankt Michael belongs to the LEADER -Region Steirische Eisenstraße and to the 18th Nov. 2009 Regionext-Kleinregion Murtal (around Leoben), but also to the tourism association HerzBergLand , to which the communities of the Kleinregion Reitingblick (Traboch, Sankt Peter-Freienstein, Trofaiach) belong . During the municipal structural reform in Styria 2010–2015 , the municipality remains independent.

Economy and infrastructure

The Landwehr barracks of the Austrian Armed Forces , in which the Jäger Battalion 18 is stationed, is located in the cadastral community of Brunn . It is the only infantry unit in Upper Styria.

The Jäger Battalion 18 is divided into:

• The battalion command, under the leadership of the battalion commander, has a staff that is organized according to basic management areas (e.g. human resources, logistics) and assists the battalion commander in leadership.
• The headquarters company takes care of the supply of all units and ensures the connection within and to the outside world. To implement the orders, it has the supply train, repair train, telecommunication train and the medical train.
• The 1st Jäger Company is characterized by extensive experience through numerous missions abroad, in-depth knowledge in the type of "protection", sport as an essential component and its broad-based management staff. Particular attention is paid to motivating personnel management and modern training.
• The 2nd Jäger Company is available as a cadre presence unit (KPE) for deployments in full at home and abroad. She is responsible for sensitive international tasks and must be available for a posting within five to 30 days.
• The combat support company has all the heavy weapons in the battalion. These include the heavy grenade launcher platoon, the anti-tank guided missile platoon, the reconnaissance platoon and the support platoon.

The sewage treatment plant of the Lower Liesingtal wastewater association and the Komptech research center are located in Murfeld. The center for resource management and waste processing of Mayer Recycling GmbH is also located in Murfeld.

The St. Michael train station is an important traffic junction in Upper Styria. In addition to the two-hourly IC trains Graz-Innsbruck / Salzburg in this station also hold the S-Bahn and and Regiobahn Styria.

Culture and sights

See also:  List of listed objects in Sankt Michael in Obersteiermark

Personalities

Honorary citizen

• 1982 Hans Gross (1930–1992), Deputy Governor

Sons and daughters of the church

• Alfred Ebenbauer (1945–2007), Old Germanist and Rector of the University of Vienna , came from St. Michael
• Rudolf Kuzner (* 1959), filmmaker and world traveler, comes from and lives in St. Michael

Associated with St. Michael

• Walter Schachner (* 1957), former soccer player and current coach , grew up in St. Michael

Web links

Commons : Sankt Michael in Obersteiermark  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

• Website of the market town
• Entry on Sankt Michael in Obersteiermark in the Austria Forum  (in the AEIOU Austria Lexicon )

• 61113 - Sankt Michael in Upper Styria. Community data, Statistics Austria .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Statistics Austria: Population on January 1st, 2020 by locality (area status on January 1st, 2020) , ( CSV )
2. ↑ AH Wagner: The battle near St. Michael-Leoben on May 25, 1809. Volume 51 of Military History Series . Bundesverlag, 1984 ISBN 978-3-215-05529-4 (321505529-5); Georg Wilhelm von Valentini: Attempting a history of the 1809 campaign on the Danube: With 3 plans. Verlag Nikolai, 1812, p. 99 ff ( Google eBook, full view ).
   Former battle diorama from 1809 in the Leoben Museum ( memento of the original from January 2, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The  archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. - Our army in a model. Heeres-Sport-Verein St. Michael, hsvstm.at (with photos and original sources); → Battle of Sankt Michael , engl. Wikipedia
3. ↑ Entry on Sankt Michael in Obersteiermark on the website Kommunalflaggen.eu
4. ↑ The new municipal structure of Styria ( Memento of the original from July 29, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The  archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. . List of final version A01, 2012 (pdf, gemeindeststrukturreform.steiermark.at; 97 kB).