Martin Antonenko
A Fixture
- Joined
- Jul 11, 2008
- Messages
- 8,794
66 Years After the End of the War:
Hitler Loses the Honorary Citizenship of His Hometown
On July 7, 2011, the municipal council of the Austrian city of Braunau ...
... unanimously to an intergroup motion with which Adolf Hitler is deprived of the honorary citizenship of the city!
66 years after the end of the war!
In the long time before that, Braunau had dealt with the cause very differently: they had simply hushed it up.
The supraregional Viennese daily "Kurier" got the ball rolling. At the end of May 2011, it reported on numerous honorary citizenships that Hitler had been given in Upper Austria.
Most of them in 1938, in connection with the so-called "Anschluss" of the "Ostmark" (as Austria was then called).
ONE SINGLE honorary citizenship was granted to Hitler in 1933, shortly after his "seizure of power": namely that of Braunau, a town with a population of almost 17,000 today.
Those responsible initially turned to denial:
"Not true", replied the Braunau Deputy Mayor Günter Pointner (Austrian Social Democrats, SPÖ) ...
...and Brigitte Zeillinger (Austrian Liberal Democrats, FPÖ)...
... towards the Austria Press Agency.
And the responsible "Head of Public Services" in the city office, Gerald Sturmayr ...
... seconded:
"As far as I know, there is no municipal council resolution that Hitler even received honorary citizenship of Braunau."
Everything was a lie, as those responsible knew very well!
As the newspaper printed evidence, namely newspaper articles that reported about Hitler's honorary citizenship in Braunau ...
... denial was given up - and instead withdrew to a formal legal position:
"Adolf Hitler is known to be dead and honorary citizenship expires with the death of the honored person. So Hitler is no longer an honorary citizen of Braunau."
Politically, however, this position could not be held for long - and all the less so since a number of other Upper Austrian municipalities revoked Hitler's once-granted honorary citizenship by resolution of their local parliaments.
That is how the decision was made in Braunau on July 7, 2011.
(To explain the "evidence newspaper article" shown above: The "Ranshofen community" mentioned therein was and is one of four districts of the city of Braunau, namely the one in which Hitler was born and which was responsible for granting honorary citizenship at the time .)
Hitler himself was known to have little interest in Braunau and his parents' house ...:
During the whole time of the so-called "Großdeutsches Reich" he only stopped by Braunau briefly once, when he was passing through to Vienna in 1938 ...
... where the annexation of Austria (or, as it was called at the time, "The return of the Ostmark to the German Empire") was to be celebrated at a mass rally on Heldenplatz.
The following photo was taken during this visit, with the parents' house in the background ...:
The house is still standing today, a simple memorial has now been set in front of it ...:
The inscription reads:
"For peace, freedom
and democracy
Never again fascism
Admonish millions of dead "
It is no shame for the city of Braunau that the greatest criminal of all time was born there.
But it is a - lasting - shame, however, that for 66 years they denied that he was an honorary citizen there and that it finally took it away from him - and only under pressure from outside!
Hitler Loses the Honorary Citizenship of His Hometown
On July 7, 2011, the municipal council of the Austrian city of Braunau ...
... unanimously to an intergroup motion with which Adolf Hitler is deprived of the honorary citizenship of the city!
66 years after the end of the war!
In the long time before that, Braunau had dealt with the cause very differently: they had simply hushed it up.
The supraregional Viennese daily "Kurier" got the ball rolling. At the end of May 2011, it reported on numerous honorary citizenships that Hitler had been given in Upper Austria.
Most of them in 1938, in connection with the so-called "Anschluss" of the "Ostmark" (as Austria was then called).
ONE SINGLE honorary citizenship was granted to Hitler in 1933, shortly after his "seizure of power": namely that of Braunau, a town with a population of almost 17,000 today.
Those responsible initially turned to denial:
"Not true", replied the Braunau Deputy Mayor Günter Pointner (Austrian Social Democrats, SPÖ) ...
...and Brigitte Zeillinger (Austrian Liberal Democrats, FPÖ)...
... towards the Austria Press Agency.
And the responsible "Head of Public Services" in the city office, Gerald Sturmayr ...
... seconded:
"As far as I know, there is no municipal council resolution that Hitler even received honorary citizenship of Braunau."
Everything was a lie, as those responsible knew very well!
As the newspaper printed evidence, namely newspaper articles that reported about Hitler's honorary citizenship in Braunau ...
... denial was given up - and instead withdrew to a formal legal position:
"Adolf Hitler is known to be dead and honorary citizenship expires with the death of the honored person. So Hitler is no longer an honorary citizen of Braunau."
Politically, however, this position could not be held for long - and all the less so since a number of other Upper Austrian municipalities revoked Hitler's once-granted honorary citizenship by resolution of their local parliaments.
That is how the decision was made in Braunau on July 7, 2011.
(To explain the "evidence newspaper article" shown above: The "Ranshofen community" mentioned therein was and is one of four districts of the city of Braunau, namely the one in which Hitler was born and which was responsible for granting honorary citizenship at the time .)
Hitler himself was known to have little interest in Braunau and his parents' house ...:
During the whole time of the so-called "Großdeutsches Reich" he only stopped by Braunau briefly once, when he was passing through to Vienna in 1938 ...
... where the annexation of Austria (or, as it was called at the time, "The return of the Ostmark to the German Empire") was to be celebrated at a mass rally on Heldenplatz.
The following photo was taken during this visit, with the parents' house in the background ...:
The house is still standing today, a simple memorial has now been set in front of it ...:
The inscription reads:
"For peace, freedom
and democracy
Never again fascism
Admonish millions of dead "
It is no shame for the city of Braunau that the greatest criminal of all time was born there.
But it is a - lasting - shame, however, that for 66 years they denied that he was an honorary citizen there and that it finally took it away from him - and only under pressure from outside!
