Wibke Bruhns

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Wibke Bruhns, 2012

Wibke Gertrud Bruhns (née Klamroth ; born September 8, 1938 in Halberstadt ; † June 20, 2019 in Hamburg ) was a German journalist and author . She presented a news program on German television (1971/72 on ZDF , in the late edition of the program today ) as the first woman. In addition to her work as an editor and presenter for various television stations, Wibke Bruhns was the correspondent for the Stern in Jerusalem and Washington DC and the spokesperson for Expo 2000 .

Life

Bruhns lived as a freelance writer in Berlin . Her sister is the lawyer and author Sabine Klamroth . Their eldest daughter Annika Bruhns , born in 1966, is an actress and singer. Their second daughter, the journalist Meike Bruhns, was born in 1968. Wibke Bruhns married Peter Teichgräber, an advertising salesman, in 1961. The marriage ended in divorce the following year. From 1965 until his death in 1977 she was married to the actor Werner Bruhns . The two daughters emerged from this marriage.

In the course of her professional career, she spent several years in Israel and the USA.

Childhood, youth and family

Bruhns was born as the youngest of five children of the businessman Hans Georg Klamroth and his wife Else. Her father was a member of the Reiter-SS and served as a reserve major as a defense officer in the Wehrmacht during World War II . On August 15, 1944 , he was sentenced to death for high treason on August 15, 1944 as a confidante of the failed Hitler assassination attempt on July 20, 1944 , and executed in Plötzensee on August 26, 1944 . Her mother Else Klamroth, née Podeus , was the daughter of a manufacturer from Wismar . After the death of her husband, Else Klamroth had to raise the five children alone. In the summer of 1948 the family moved from Halberstadt to Braunschweig . In the nearby German-German border town of Mattierzoll , Else Klamroth initially ran a branch of the Halberstadt family company. Nevertheless, the family was in financial difficulties and lived on donations from the relief organization July 20th . In 1949 Wibke Bruhns was temporarily in a children's home in Gaienhofen on Lake Constance. After years of negotiations, Else Klamroth was awarded compensation for the sentencing and execution of her husband.

During the Third Reich, Else Klamroth was the local group leader of the Halberstadt Nazi women's association. In 1949 she joined the diplomatic service of the Federal Republic of Germany. In the course of this, the family moved to Stockholm , where Else Klamroth was head of department at the German embassy.

education

Bruhns attended various boarding schools during her school career. Before moving to Sweden, a grant from the relief organization July 20 enabled her to attend the Protestant Bugenhagen boarding school in Timmendorfer Strand . She later went to boarding school in Plön , which she had to leave prematurely because of a relationship with a classmate. Bruhns graduated from high school in Berlin. After graduating from high school, she went to London for six months , where her mother was working in the German embassy at the time. She then attended a business school for a year. She broke off studying history and political science in Hamburg .

Work in the media

Bruhns began working in the media industry at the age of 22. For the first time, she received broader attention as a spokeswoman for NDR 2 broadcasting, where in the early 1970s she took over the moderation of the program Five O'clock Club for one hour, alternating with Monika Jetter and Henning Venske. This program was specially tailored to the musical tastes of the youth of the time, where Krautrock and popular songwriters were also played with their songs. During her career, Wibke Bruhns worked as a journalist for various television stations as well as for various newspapers and magazines. She was best known for her work as the first news anchor on West German television.

First work experience

Bruhns gained her first journalistic experience at the Bild -Zeitung , where she completed a traineeship in 1960 , which she broke off prematurely for political reasons because she did not agree with an article that appeared in the Bild -Zeitung. The article was published on the occasion of the construction of the Berlin Wall . The politics of the GDR were compared with the seizure of power by Adolf Hitler .

Work on television

Bruhns switched to NDR television as a freelancer and ran regional reporting for the editorial team “Mensch und Landschaft”. With her supervisor from the "Mensch und Landschaft" editorial team, she later switched to the newly founded ZDF, where she initially presented the program Die Drehscheibe , among other things . She was also involved in setting up the ZDF studio in Hamburg .

From 1968 to 1971 Bruhns worked as a freelancer for Die Zeit and NDR radio in addition to her work for ZDF .

First news anchor

On May 12, 1971 at 10:15 p.m. Bruhns hosted the ZDF news program today for the first time . She was the first news anchor on German television. In the GDR , Annerose Neumann had already spoken the news for the first time in the current camera of the DFF on March 8, 1963 . The fact that a woman was reading the news caused a great stir. Protests came mainly from viewers who asked Bruhns to look after her husband and children instead of working as a news anchor. At the same time, however, she was hailed as a heroine by other groups, including trade unionists and feminists. She did not see herself as a member of the women's movement, as she writes in her autobiography: "Union women lifted me up on their shield, women's magazines offered protection, and when Alice Schwarzer started her campaign 'We aborted' in Stern a month later , I mutated, although completely uninvolved, in the public perception one of the champions of the apparently completely wacky German women ”. She was not particularly enthusiastic about her work as a newscaster: “Reading other people's texts without interpreting them myself was not my thing. [...] I wanted to go. But then it would look, the ZDF superiors pointed out, as if the 'experiment' newswoman had failed. I didn't want to risk that ”. After 380 "today" programs, Bruhns quit her job as a news anchor to take care of her two young children.

At the beginning of 1973 she went back to work and worked for the WDR , where she drew attention to herself with articles for the political magazine " Panorama ". She also worked for the SWF from 1974 . During her time as a news anchor, Bruhns supported Willy Brandt's SPD election campaign , which caused a stir (see “Political Engagement”).

Editor at Stern

In addition to her work at WDR, Bruhns began to work as a freelancer for Stern . From 1979 she worked as a correspondent for Stern in Jerusalem and Washington DC.

Correspondent in Israel

After her husband Werner Bruhns died in 1977, Wibke Bruhns moved to Jerusalem in 1979 with her two daughters as a Middle East correspondent for Stern . Due to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict , the country found itself in a difficult and unstable situation. During this time, Bruhns conducted interviews with, among others, Adnan Jabar, the assassin in Hebron , Yasser Arafat , Moshe Dajan and Abu Iyad . She also reported on the civil war in Lebanon . At the beginning of the civil war, she was visiting the German ambassador in Beirut, Rüdiger von Pachelbel , when the embassy was also under attack.

The star struggled with problems during this period. On April 25, 1983, the magazine published the supposed Hitler diaries . A week later, the forgery became known and the responsible editors-in-chief resigned. Bruhns was part of the commission for the replacement. In the course of the affair over the forged Hitler diaries, she also appeared on the WDR program Der Internationale Frühschoppen with Werner Höfer , in which she strongly criticized the actions of Stern .

In 1983 she decided to leave Jerusalem. She herself described the reason for the return journey as follows: “The joy was worn down into exhaustion. My curiosity was no longer ready to expect the new catastrophe every day. ”She recorded her experiences as a Middle East correspondent in her first book“ My Jerusalem ”, which was published in 1982.

Correspondent in the USA

From the summer of 1985 Bruhns worked as a correspondent for Stern in Washington, DC . Among other things, she reported on political events during Ronald Reagan's tenure , the various religious communities in North America, the INF treaty for the destruction of nuclear weapons and conducted several interviews, including with the physicist Edward Teller , who became known as the "father of the hydrogen bomb". She was awarded the Egon Erwin Kisch Prize for a report for Geo magazine about the Vietnam Memorial in Washington DC . After four years in the USA , Bruhns returned to Europe and moved to Ingolsheim in Alsace .

Later professional years

From 1989 Bruhns worked for the WDR and, together with Gisela Marx , moderated the political talk show "Drei vor Mitternacht". She also moderated the Mittagsmagazin on WDR radio, made broadcasts on Deutsche Welle , made films for Arte and Südwestfunk and wrote columns and comments for various print media, including for the evening newspaper , the magazine Natur and also for Stern.

In 1993 Bruhns hosted the news on VOX . After VOX went into liquidation on April 1, 1994 and 250 employees were dismissed, she switched to ORB in 1995 , where she became head of culture. In 2000 she was the spokesperson for the World Expo 2000 in Hanover.

Private

Wibke Bruhns last lived in Berlin . On July 19, 2019, there was a funeral service in chapel 13 at the Ohlsdorf cemetery , at which 170 close family members and colleagues were present. She was buried in the Ohlsdorf cemetery (grave site BK 61-1121).

Political commitment

As a student in Hamburg, Bruhns was a member of the SPD . Shortly after becoming known as a news anchor, she actively supported the SPD election campaign of Federal Chancellor Willy Brandt in 1972. She toured all of Germany for numerous election events, which caused criticism and uproar. Meanwhile, the CDU commissioned the preparation of an expert opinion that should clarify whether it is permissible to be politically active as an employee of a public television broadcaster. The report showed that this was not allowed, but it was only completed after the election campaign.

For decades there was a rumor that Wibke Bruhns had an affair with Willy Brandt, which she denied. She won several lawsuits in which she defied media that spread rumors of a love affair.

Publications

Journalistic work

  • Trend reversal in the Middle East. In: Stern, February 12, 1981, No. 8, p. 238.

This article is one of many that was written during the period when Wibke Bruhns was working as a correspondent for Stern in Israel. In the article she reports on the first signs of rapprochement between the Israelis and Palestinians, who had been at war for years. In the article, Bruhns justifies her observation with the following greeting from a politician of the Palestine Liberation Organization ( PLO ): “Sooner than our enemies believe, peace will come about between the Palestinian state and the state of Israel, between the two peoples. And it will continue. "

  • The last days of Beirut. In: Stern, August 5, 1982, No. 36, p. 106.

This article was also written during Bruhns' Israel correspondance. In it, she describes the last days of the Lebanese civil war and gives an overview of the political events during the war. Among other things, she criticizes the lack of help from the Soviet Union and the GDR: “The expected help from the Soviet Union in the Lebanon war did not materialize”.

  • Exodus to a strange home. Russia emigrants in Israel (with Thomas Hegenbart). In: GEO, Hamburg, April 1992 (4), pp. 88-104.
  • When the ZDF dared something. In: Die Zeit, May 28, 2009, online.

In this article, Wibke Bruhns describes her work as the first female newscaster on West German radio and her role as campaign assistant to Willy Brandt.

Writing work

  • My Jerusalem. Pictures by Amos Schliack. Gruner and Jahr, Hamburg 1982, ISBN 3-570-04952-3 .

In her first book, Mein Jerusalem , Wibke Bruhns describes her experiences as a Stern correspondent in Israel.

  • My father's country. Story of a German family. Econ Verlag, Berlin 2004, ISBN 3-430225-71-X .

In Meines Vaters Land , Wibke Bruhns describes the life of her father Hans Georg Klamroth , who was initially a supporter of National Socialism , a member of the NSDAP and the SS , and who was later executed as an accomplice in the Hitler attack .

In her autobiography News Time, Wibke Bruhns describes both her private and professional experiences. At the same time, it leads through the most important political events of the past decades.

Other work

  • I have a child (with Ursula Klamroth). Falken-Verlag Erich Sicker, Wiesbaden 1969.
  • Everyone is talking about foreign words. 1000 terms that we encounter every day. Schwann, Düsseldorf 1972.
  • The man in the backlight. In: Roger Anderson, Wibke Bruhns, Emanuel Eckardt et al .: Medienmacher. Journalists describe the rulers of the fourth estate. Rasch and Röhring, Hamburg 1996, ISBN 3-89136-568-3 .

Movie

  • My father's country - a German family story. TV documentary, Germany 2007, 45 min., Written and directed: Gabriele Conradt and Gabriele Dennecke, production: RBB , first broadcast: January 3, 2007

reception

Wibke Bruhns has repeatedly been the subject of public discussions. The rumor that she had an affair with Federal Chancellor Willy Brandt probably caused a stir . These rumors began in 1973 when Brandt invited the journalist to her hotel room at a late hour on a state visit to Israel . After leaving the hotel room at around 2 a.m., the rumor spread within a few hours. Another reason for the rumor arose when Bruhns and her family were spending their summer holidays in the Brandt family's vacation home.

In 1974 a lady's necklace appeared in Willy Brandt's hotel bed, which led to rumors that Brandt was having an affair. Herbert Wehner used this event as leverage to force Brandt to resign. Rumors arose that the necklace belonged to Wibke Bruhns. The rumor of an affair between Brandt and Bruhns subsided somewhat when Brigitte Seebacher-Brandt , Brandt's wife, announced that her husband had been in a relationship with the journalist Heli Ihlefeld for a long time . Bruhns also stated that he knew about it and, for reasons of discretion, had not clarified the mix-up.

In recent years, feminists have increasingly criticized Bruhns. In January 2013 she was a guest of Günther Jauch . Her statements that played down sexism sparked discussions in online forums . Among other things, she mentioned that women are women and men are men and that they are as different as bulls and cows and that women have no chance against sexism.

Literary reception

Wibke Bruhns' literary works received mostly positive reviews.

Her book My Father's Land became a bestseller in 2004. Hermann Rudolph sums it up in the Tagesspiegel : “Wibke Bruhns cleverly arranges the huge material that flowed towards her from the family estate and cleverly puts it into the context of the 'great' story. But she does not stay out of history, she cannot and does not want to, and by telling, quoting and explaining, she quarrels with her father, suffers with her mother, takes into account the manners and customs of the great clan, of course often too with ridicule and amazement. ”Joachim Kronsbein also describes the book in Spiegel magazine as“ a fascinating mixture of private chronicle, contemporary report and personal search for identity ”.

In the Frankfurter Rundschau , Elke Schubert writes: “But much more significant than getting closer to the unknown father and his motives is that the author succeeded in demonstrating the inevitability and ignorance with which the Klamroths 'slipped' into National Socialism despite their open-mindedness. and within a very short time accepted those values ​​that implied the 'racially' based persecution and the suppression of any deviating view. ”Sabine Vogel also praises in the taz :“ Wibke Bruhns cleverly assembles quotes from letters, information on the political and economic situation and her own comments a descriptive description. ”However, she also notes:“ It remains somewhat unclear [...] on which source the information is based. [...] In the explanatory passages on current affairs, one would like to know which secondary literature the author is quoting. "

Christian Esch states in the Berliner Zeitung : “The daughter holds up [her father] with misconduct [...] strictly and clearly, as does his manic infidelity in marriage. [...] On the other hand, she judges strangely mildly when it comes to the perpetration of the father in the narrower sense. "

Awards

Web links

Commons : Wibke Bruhns  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Longstanding presenter today: Journalist Wibke Bruhns is dead. Accessed June 21, 2019 .
  2. ^ Wibke Bruhns (2012): News Time. My unfinished memories. Munich: Droemer Verlag, p. 91.
  3. ↑ Wibke and Meike Bruhns: »You can do that« , taz.de , taz, issue 9959 of November 7, 2012, p. 7
  4. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j Who 's who: Wibke Bruhns. Retrieved December 2, 2014 .
  5. ↑ Wibke Bruhns: My father's country ; S. 158, Econ Verlag, 2004, ISBN 3-430-11571-X
  6. ^ Wibke Bruhns: Nachrichtenenzeit, pp. 9-19.
  7. ^ Wibke Bruhns: Nachrichtenenzeit, p. 52.
  8. ↑ Wibke Bruhns: News Time, p. 27.
  9. ^ Wibke Bruhns: Nachrichtenenzeit, pp. 30, 44, 51, 62.
  10. ^ Wibke Bruhns: Nachrichtenenzeit, p. 65.
  11. ↑ Wibke Bruhns: Nachrichtenenzeit, pp. 67–68.
  12. ^ Wibke Bruhns: Nachrichtenenzeit, pp. 68–69.
  13. ^ Wibke Bruhns: Nachrichtenenzeit, pp. 69–71.
  14. ^ Wibke Bruhns: Nachrichtenenzeit, p. 78.
  15. ^ Wibke Bruhns: Nachrichtenenzeit, pp. 78–79.
  16. ^ Wibke Bruhns: Nachrichtenenzeit, p. 91.
  17. ^ Wibke Bruhns: Nachrichtenenzeit, pp. 190–275.
  18. ^ Wibke Bruhns: Nachrichtenenzeit, p. 195.
  19. ↑ Irene Jung: Wibke Bruhns: Always good for a message. Hamburger Abendblatt, March 1, 2012, accessed December 4, 2014 .
  20. ^ Wibke Bruhns: Nachrichtenenzeit, p. 249.
  21. ^ Wibke Bruhns: Nachrichtenenzeit, p. 291.
  22. ^ Wibke Bruhns: Nachrichtenenzeit, pp. 306–332.
  23. ^ Wibke Bruhns: Nachrichtenenzeit, p. 350 ff.
  24. ^ Wibke Bruhns: Nachrichtenenzeit, pp. 355/394.
  25. ↑ Grande Dame with poise and tenacity
  26. ↑ The grave of Wibke Bruhns. In: knerger.de. Klaus Nerger, accessed on July 24, 2019 .
  27. ^ The resting places of Hamburg's personalities
  28. ↑ Hamburger Abendblatt
  29. ^ Wibke Bruhns: Nachrichtenenzeit , pp. 80–82.
  30. ^ Newswoman Bruhns: No sex with Willy Brandt , augsburger-allgemeine.de from March 1, 2012
  31. ^ The first news woman in West Germany , long biographical interview on Deutschlandfunk Kultur, broadcast and accessed December 20, 2018
  32. ↑ Gruner + Jahr press database
  33. ↑ Gruner + Jahr press database
  34. ↑ Wibke Bruhns: When the ZDF dared something. Die Zeit, September 8, 2009, accessed December 19, 2014 .
  35. ↑ Die Welt: The legend of Brandt's affair with the ZDF lady. March 1, 2012, accessed December 4, 2014 .
  36. ^ Wibke Bruhns: Nachrichtenenzeit, p. 112.
  37. ^ Wibke Bruhns: News Time, p. 134.
  38. ↑ Hamburger Abendblatt
  39. ↑ Ines Kappert: Of men, bulls and oxen. January 28, 2013, accessed December 4, 2014 .
  40. ↑ Karnele Weblog: Bruhns, Wibke and the Sexism, January 28, 2013, online at Bruhns, Wibke and the Sexism ( Memento of July 13, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) (accessed on December 4, 2014).
  41. ^ Hermann Rudolph: Were the Germans like that? In: Der Tagesspiegel . May 3, 2004, p. 25 .
  42. ↑ Joachim Kronsbein: So lost forever. Der Spiegel, February 16, 2004, accessed December 19, 2014 .
  43. ^ Elke Schubert: Visiting normality . In: Frankfurter Rundschau . April 6, 2004, p. 19 .
  44. ↑ Sabine Vogel: Political book: My mother's love . In: The daily newspaper . July 17, 2004.
  45. ^ Christian Esch: From fathers and seams . In: Berliner Zeitung . March 25, 2004, p. 25th f .
personal data
SURNAME Bruhns, Wibke
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Bruhns, Wibke Gertrud (full name); Klamroth, Wibke (maiden name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German journalist and author
DATE OF BIRTH September 8, 1938
PLACE OF BIRTH Halberstadt
DATE OF DEATH 20th June 2019
Place of death Hamburg