Forward publishing house
The forward-Verlag was until 1988 the party publishing house of the Austrian social democracy , especially the party organ, in the Arbeiter-Zeitung was released. The existing, listed publishing house, which was occupied in 1910, in the 5th district of Vienna , Rechts Wienzeile 97, was also the headquarters of the SDAPÖ until the party was banned in 1934 and the seat of the Republican Protection Association until it was banned in 1933 . Today the Association for the History of the Workers 'Movement with the archive of the Austrian workers' movement, the Bruno Kreisky Archive Foundation and the Johanna Dohnal Archive are housed here.
history
The Arbeiter-Zeitung , founded in 1889 and appearing as a daily newspaper from January 1, 1895 , was first printed by L. Bergmann. On March 6, 1900 the '' Druck- und Verlagsanstalt Vorwärts, M. Frisch & Co '' was entered in the Vienna Commercial Register. The general partner of the party publisher was the printing company owner Moritz Frisch, and party chairman Victor Adler and party board member Julius Popp appeared as limited partners with a contribution of 4,000 kroner each .
Editing, administration and printing were initially rented for ten years in the apartment buildings 6., Mariahilfer Strasse 89 and 89a. When the party received a secure parliamentary basis due to the introduction of the general, equal male suffrage in 1907 (in this election it became the second largest parliamentary group in the House of Representatives of the Reichsrat ), the construction of its own editorial and printing building became a matter of urgency.
The printing and publishing building at Rechten Wienzeile 97 in the 5th district ( forward building ), built from 1907 to 1910, was planned by the architects Hubert Gessner and Franz Gessner and was occupied on July 20, 1910. The stone figures worker and worker on both sides of the clock on the facade were created in 1910 by Anton Hanak . Hans Moser's birthplace had to give way to the new building; a plaque on house no. 93 reminds of this.
In addition to the Arbeiter-Zeitung , the publishing house also produced Das Kleine Blatt , the weekly newspaper Die Frau and the illustrated magazine Der Kuckuck .
Before 1914, among others, left-wing Russian exiles such as Leon Trotsky and Vladimir Ilyich Lenin visited the party chairman Victor Adler (who died in 1918) in the forward building.
The forward building was occupied by the police on February 9, 1934, two days before the outbreak of the February uprising or the civil war (the naming of the events depends on the political attitude). The company name Vorwärts was retained from 1934 to 1945 when the Social Democrats were eliminated from the corporate state or NS dictatorship. After the Second World War, the SPÖ, recognized as the legal successor to the SDAPÖ, set up its headquarters in Löwelstrasse in the 1st district .
The editorial and printing works of AZ , Frau , the monthly magazine Zukunft and other periodicals remained in the historical forward building until 1986 . The decline of the party newspapers weighed heavily on AZ and its publishing house; Party chairman Bruno Kreisky , however, rejected any thought of sale or liquidation. He is quoted as saying: I don't want to have to read the history book: Vorwärts Verlag, founded by Victor Adler, sold by Bruno Kreisky.
An offensive modernization strategy was attempted under Kreisky's short-term successor, Fred Sinowatz , and the severely deficit publishing house ( ÖVP MP Werner Amon later spoke of a total loss of 500 million schillings) moved to the new office and printing center at Viehmarktgasse 4 in the 3rd district in 1986 .
The "Hotel Ananas" was built in place of most of the publishing house and its outdated printing plant. The financial impact of this short-term offensive strategy, however, reinforced the catastrophic financial situation and so the Vorwärts under Sinowatz's successor, Franz Vranitzky , ultimately had to be sold to Mediaprint for a symbolic amount of 74 percent in the fall of 1988 .
The historic meeting rooms of the party executive can still be found in the listed wing. The exterior is characterized by a stepped gable with a large clock, which is unusual for Vienna. The Pilgramgasse underground station is in front of the house.
literature
- Marion Gusel: The importance of the social democratic press and the printing and publishing company "Vorwärts" for the development of the social democratic workers' party in Austria. From the beginning until 1938. Vienna 1991 (Vienna, university, diploma thesis, 1991).
- Wolfgang Maderthaner : "Forward". Das Haus an der Wienzeile (= Association for the History of the Labor Movement. Documentation. 4, 1995, ZDB -ID 1181472-x ). Association for the History of the Labor Movement, Vienna 1995.
- Helmut Weihsmann: The Red Vienna. Social democratic architecture and local politics 1919–1934. Promedia, Vienna 1985, ISBN 3-900478-07-4 (2nd, completely revised edition, ibid 2002, ISBN 3-85371-181-2 ).
- Druck & Verlagsanstalt "Vorwärts" - 75 years . In: Arbeiter-Zeitung . Vienna May 5, 1975, p. 8 ( berufer-zeitung.at - the open online archive - digitized).
- Saved from bankruptcy - "Mediaprint" in "Vorwärts" . In: Arbeiter-Zeitung . Vienna October 18, 1988, p. 4 ( berufer-zeitung.at - the open online archive - digitized).
Web links
- Forward. In: dasrotewien.at - Web dictionary of the Viennese social democracy. SPÖ Vienna (Ed.)