Friedrich Reinhart
Friedrich Reinhart | |
|---|---|
Supervisory Board Chairman Commerz- und Privat-Bank | |
| In office July 1934 – 3 October 1943 | |
| Preceded by | Franz Heinrich Witthoefft |
| Succeeded by | Paul Marx |
| Personal details | |
| Born | 23 February 1871 Banker |
Friedrich "Fritz" Reinhart (23 February 1871 – 3 October 1943) was a German
Early life and banking career
Reinhart was born in Darmstadt in 1871 and, after elementary school, began an apprenticeship at the Darmstädter Volksbank in 1885. From 1892 to 1895 he worked there as deputy cashier. In 1905 he transferred to the Württembergische Landesbank and became a board member. After it merged with the Dresdner Bank, Reinhart went to work for the Mitteldeutsche Creditbank of Frankfurt and Berlin, as a director and member of the management board (Vorstand) from 1910 to 1929. After a merger with Commerz- und Privat-Bank, he then became a member of its management board from 1929 to July 1934 when he became chairman of its Supervisory Board (Aufsichtsrat), essentially its chief executive officer. In the same year, he became president of the Berlin stock exchange. During the banking crisis of 1931, he vehemently criticized Germany's indebtedness due to its reliance on short-term foreign loans.[1]
On 12 February 1935, Reinhart became president of the Berlin Chamber of Industry and Commerce. On 14 March 1935 be was named head of the Chamber of Commerce for the Brandenburg Economic District. This was followed on 11 October 1935 by his appointment to the presidium of the German Institute for Banking Science in Berlin. In December 1937, he joined the administrative council of the Hamburg World Economic Institute. He was named to the Advisory Board of the Deutsche Reichsbahn on 7 November 1939 and, on 1 January 1943, he became the president of the Berlin-Brandenburg district Chamber of Commerce. During these years, he was also a member of the executive boards of multiple business and industrial enterprises, as well as the central committee of the Reichsbank.[2]
Political activity in the Weimar years
In an attempt in January 1920 to get a number of banks to support the
Reinhart also belonged to the Keppler circle, a study group initially of about a dozen business and industry leaders originally formed as an economic study group by Wilhelm Keppler early in 1932 at the suggestion of Adolf Hitler.[7] On 19 November 1932, along with Schacht and Thyssen, Reinhart was one of the 19 signatories of the Industrielleneingabe (industrial petition) to Hindenburg, which strongly advocated for the appointment of Hitler as Chancellor.[8]
Career in Nazi Germany
After the
References
- ^ a b Friedrich Reinhart entry in the Deutsche Biographie
- ^ a b Lilla 2005, pp. 231–232.
- ^ Letter from the Mitteldeutsche Kreditbank to Wolfgang Kapp from January 1920. Printed in: Erwin Könnemann, Gerhard Schulze (ed.): The Kapp-Lüttwitz-Ludendorff Putsch. Munich 2002 p. 84 f.
- S2CID 248785102. Retrieved 12 July 2023.
- ^ "Germany Names Economic Board". New York Times. 22 October 1931. p. 7.
- ^ Hallgarten, George W. F. "Adolf Hitler and German Heavy Industry, 1931-1933". The Journal of Economic History. 12 (Summer, 1952): 227.
- ^ Zentner & Bedürftig 1997, p. 495.
- ^ Klee 2007, pp. 488–489.
- ^ Zentner & Bedürftig 1997, p. 770.
- ^ Zentner & Bedürftig 1997, p. 412.
Sources
- Friedrich Reinhart entry in the Deutsche Biographie
- Klee, Ernst (2007). Das Personenlexikon zum Dritten Reich. Wer war was vor und nach 1945. Frankfurt-am-Main: Fischer-Taschenbuch-Verlag. ISBN 978-3-596-16048-8.
- Lilla, Joachim (2005). Der Prußische Staatsrat 1921–1933: Ein biographisches Handbuch. Düsseldorf: Droste Verlag. ISBN 978-3-770-05271-4.
- Zentner, Christian; Bedürftig, Friedemann, eds. (1997) [1991]. ISBN 978-0-306-80793-0.