Mario Frank (born 31 May 1958) qualified in Germany as a lawyer. He holds a West German doctorate, obtained for a piece of work on the East German Ministry of Justice. He has pursued a managerial career in the media sector. For a year during 2007/2008 he was chief executive of the Spiegel publishing group. [1] In recent decades he has emerged as an important political biographer. [2] [3]
Mario Frank was born in Rostock, a major port city on the north coast of what was at that time the German Democratic Republic (East Germany). He spent most of his childhood in Switzerland, but by the time he was due to undertake his military service he did so in West Germany, at Landshut. It was also in Bavaria that he commenced his university study of jurisprudence, at University of Regensburg, but by the time he completed his degree he had moved again, this time to Freiburg im Breisgau, which is also where he passed his level I national law exams. After that he took a position as a referendary (loosely: "legal trainee") at the Berlin high court ("Kammergericht"), and then at the German-South African chamber of commerce in Johannesburg. He passed his level II national law exams in Berlin in 1987. In 1988 he received from the University of Regensburg [4] his doctorate of laws in exchange for a dissertation on developments at the East German Ministry of Justice [5]
In 1987 Frank embarked on a professional career in the media sector, employed as an assistant to Mark Wössner , who at that time was the chairman of Bertelsmann. In 1989 he sought to broaden his experience with a move to the Gruner + Jahr publishing conglomerate, initially as operations director at the Hamburger Morgenpost (newspaper) and subsequently as publishing and managing director at the company's "Boulevard newspapers" division in Hamburg, Dresden and Berlin. In 1994 he was appointed chief executive ("Geschäftsführer") at the "Dresdner Druck- und Verlagshaus GmbH & Co. KG" (printing and publishing business) which included in its portfolio the "Sächsische Zeitung" and the region's version of the "Morgenpost" (newspaper). [6]
At the start of 2007 he was appointed sole chief executive of the Spiegel publishing group. [1] His responsibilities encompassed not just the magazine but also its television company and its web presence. His time at Spiegel was characterised by a certain amount of conflict, however, and during the summer of 2008 he left. [7] His agreed resignation was formalised with effect from 15 September 2008. [8] Since 2011 Frank has worked as a self-employed lawyer in Berlin, focusing on family law. [9] Alongside that, between 2013 and 2016 he held a senior position with the newly launched Berlin Communications Consultancy "von Neuem". [10]
In parallel with his professional career, Frank has emerged as an author on contemporary history. His biography of Walter Ulbricht appeared in 2001 and has become, in the eyes of many, a standard academic work. [2] His work "Der Tod im Führerbunker – Hitlers letzte Tage" ("Death in the Führerbunker - Hitler's final days") has already been translated into five languages, with non-German editions appearing under licence in Poland, France, Latvia, Hungary and the Czech Republic. [11] In October 2013 he published his biographical study of Joachim Gauck, at that time the President of Germany.[ citation needed ]
Berliner Fussball Club Dynamo e. V., commonly abbreviated to BFC Dynamo or BFC, alternatively sometimes called Dynamo Berlin, is a German football club based in the locality of Alt-Hohenschönhausen of the borough of Lichtenberg of Berlin. BFC Dynamo was founded in 1966 from the football department of SC Dynamo Berlin and became one of the most successful clubs in East German football. The club is the record champion of East Germany with ten consecutive league championships from 1979 through 1988. BFC Dynamo competes in the fourth tier Regionalliga Nordost. The club enjoys a cross-city rivalry with 1. FC Union Berlin and a historical rivalry with SG Dynamo Dresden. The rivalry with Union Berlin is part of the Berlin derby.
Sportforum Hohenschönhausen is a multi-purpose sports complex in the locality of Alt-Hohenschönhausen of the borough of Lichtenberg in Berlin. The Sportforum was named Dynamo-Sportforum during the East German era.
Bodo Rudwaleit is a German former football goalkeeper who played as goalkeeper for the record champion BFC Dynamo from 1976 to 1989.
The Friedrich-Ludwig-Jahn-Sportpark is a multi-purpose sports complex located in the western part of the locality of Prenzlauer Berg in the borough of Pankow in Berlin. The sports complex covers an area of approximately 22 hectares and comprises several facilities. The main building is the Friedrich-Ludwig-Jahn-Stadion. The stadium is the third-largest stadium in Berlin, after the Olympiastadion and the Stadion An der Alten Försterei, with a capacity of approximately 20,000 seats, of which 15,000 are covered. Currently, the main tenants of the stadium are VSG Altglienicke and Berlin Thunder. Friedrich-Ludwig-Jahn-Sportpark was the venue for the 2018 World Para Athletics European Championships.
Jürgen Bogs is a German football coach who led BFC Dynamo to ten consecutive DDR-Oberliga titles from 1979 to 1988. Bogs was a youth coach at BFC Dynamo before becoming the coach of the first team in 1977. The ten consecutive league titles won by BFC Dynamo under Bogs is an achievement that has never been matched by any other coach in European club football.
Hubertus Knabe is a German historian and was the scientific director of the Berlin-Hohenschönhausen Memorial, a museum and memorial in a notorious former Stasi torture prison in Berlin. Knabe is noted for several works on oppression in the former communist states of Eastern Europe, particularly in East Germany. He early became involved with Green politics, and was active in the Green Party in Germany.
Joachim Wilhelm Gauck is a German politician and civil rights activist who served as President of Germany from 2012 to 2017. A former Lutheran pastor, he came to prominence as an anti-communist civil rights activist in East Germany.
Hubertus Primus is a lawyer, journalist and manager. He was the editor-in-chief of the magazine test and is executive director and a member of the management board of Stiftung Warentest, the German consumer organisation.
Elmar Pieroth was a German politician (CDU). The businessman was a member of the Bundestag from 1969 until 1981. He was the senator for economic affairs in Berlin from 1981 until 1989 and from 1996 until 1998, as well as the Senator of Finance from 1991 until 1996.
Ilko-Sascha Kowalczuk is a German historian and author. His work is focused on the German Democratic Republic and its Ministry for State Security.
Horst Bartel was a German historian and university professor. He was involved in most of the core historiography projects undertaken in the German Democratic Republic (1949–1989). His work on the nineteenth-century German Labour movement places him firmly in the mainstream tradition of Marxist–Leninist historical interpretation.
Gisela Steineckert is a German writer known for her books and song lyrics. She has also written numerous radio plays and several film scripts. In terms of published output she was particularly prolific before 1989, but her professional career has nevertheless outlasted the German Democratic Republic.
Dagmar Enkelmann is a German politician of Die Linke party.
Helmut Roewer is a German lawyer and author. He served between 1994 and 2000 as president of the regional office for protection of the constitution in Thuringia. This is a state-level security agency. Controversy in respect of his time in office has persisted, although he himself robustly rejects most of the criticisms of his decisions made at that time.
Ursula Männle is a German Social sciences academic and politician (CSU). She served between 1983 and 1994 as a member of the Bundestag. More recently, between 2000 and 2013, she was a member of the Bavarian Landtag, chairing an important parliamentary committee and, till 2009, chairing the women's working group in the Landtag.
Gerhard Riege was a respected East German law professor.
Dieter Hebig is a German archivist and historian.
The 1989–90 season was tumultuous for BFC Dynamo. The East German regime faltered and parts of the Berlin Wall were opened on 9 November 1989. Forward Andreas Thom became the first player in the DDR-Oberliga to leave for the West German Bundesliga. The dismantling of the champion team from the 1980s was now well underway. The Stasi was dissolved and the club thus lost a major sponsor. The East German Ministry of the Interior declared that it was only prepared to support the club until the end of the 1989–90 season. The club changed its name to FC Berlin on 19 February 1990, in an attempt to distance the club from the Stasi. The number of spectators dropped drastically. FC Berlin finished the 1989-90 DDR-Oberliga in fourth place and failed for the first time to qualify for a European competition. Also Thomas Doll, Frank Rohde and Rainer Ernst left for the Bundesliga after the season.
Andrea Voßhoff is a German former lawyer who switched to full-time politics in mid-career (CDU). She served as a member of the Bundestag between 1998 and 2013 when, as a "party list" candidate, she narrowly failed to secure re-election in the Brandenburg-Potsam electoral district.
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