User:Battleofalma/Articles/Wilhelm Franke

Wilhelm Franke (born July 29, 1891 in Saarburg, [1] † 14 February 1945 in Dresden ) was a Social Democrat city ​​councilor and anti-fascist.

Wilhelm Franke worked as a teacher in the Dresden suburb of Blasewitz and the neighboring district of Striesen. In 1919 he joined the SPD and became a member of the board of the newly founded by Kurt Schumann Dresden Volkshochschule. Franke actively supported the introduction of the unified school. In 1926 he was elected city councilor in Dresden. In this position, he served on the Supervisory Board of DREWAG as well as in the Constitutional and School Committees. He was elected 2nd chairman of the SPD parliamentary group. In the social-democratically-dominated self-protection organization Reichsbanner Schwarz-Rot-Gold He had the function of the 2nd Gau chairman of the district of East Saxony and at the same time the first chairman of the Dresden local group held.

In March 1933, shortly after the seizure of power, Wilhelm Franke was arrested in Plauen in Plauen and dismissed from the service. After the release, he opened a cigar shop in Dresden with his wife. This shop also served as an illegal meeting place for the Dresdner SPD comrades, who maintained their connections with each other and supported themselves and their relatives. In 1944 Franke was again arrested by the Gestapoand his business closed. On February 14, 1945, he and his family were killed in the air raids on Dresden.

In 1946 the former Finckenfangstraße in the district of Leubnitz-Neuostra in Dresden was renamed Wilhelm-Franke-Straße. From 1988 to 1990, the current 68th primary school "Am Heiligen Born", where Franke had worked as a teacher, [2] bore the honorary name "Wilhelm Franke". A sandstone block with an inscription still reminds today of the location of the school on Heiligenbornstraße 15 to Wilhelm Franke. [3]