Marie Torhorst (28 December 1888 – 7 May 1989) was a German school teacher and political activist who became an
East German
East Germany, officially known as the German Democratic Republic (GDR), was a country in Central Europe from its formation on 7 October 1949 until its reunification with West Germany (FRG) on 3 October 1990. Until 1989, it was generally vie ...
politician. She served as Minister for People's Education in the state of
Thuringia
Thuringia (; officially the Free State of Thuringia, ) is one of Germany, Germany's 16 States of Germany, states. With 2.1 million people, it is 12th-largest by population, and with 16,171 square kilometers, it is 11th-largest in area.
Er ...
between 1947 and 1950.
Some sources identify her as "the first-ever female minister (on state or national level) in the history of Germany". Others are content to record that, within Germany, she was the first-ever female minister in the state of
Thuringia
Thuringia (; officially the Free State of Thuringia, ) is one of Germany, Germany's 16 States of Germany, states. With 2.1 million people, it is 12th-largest by population, and with 16,171 square kilometers, it is 11th-largest in area.
Er ...
.
Marie Torhorst stated and proved what is today known as
the Carathéodory-Torhorst theorem in her 1918 doctoral dissertation. The dissertation was subsequently lost and Torhorst's contribution was for many decades overlooked; but in the twenty-first century mathematics scholars are happy to acknowledge and celebrate her work.
Life
Provenance
Marie Torhorst was born at the end of the so-called "Year of the Three Emperors
The Year of the Three Emperors, or the Year of the Three Kaisers (), refers to the year 1888 during the German Empire in German history.PikeTipton, p. 175.Nichols, p. 1.Berghahn, p. 282. The year is considered to have memorable significance beca ...
" in Ledde, then as now a sleepy village in the flat countryside west of Osnabrück
Osnabrück (; ; archaic English: ''Osnaburg'') is a city in Lower Saxony in western Germany. It is situated on the river Hase in a valley penned between the Wiehen Hills and the northern tip of the Teutoburg Forest. With a population of 168 ...
. She was the seventh and youngest child of Arnold Torhorst (1841–1909), the local parson and his wife, born Luise Smend (1847–1923). The family seems to have been intellectually gifted. Marie's elder sister, Adelheid
Adelheid is the modern Dutch and German form of the Old High German female given name Adalheid, meaning "nobility" or "noble-ness". It may refer to the following people:
* Saint Adelheid or Adelaide of Italy, (931–999), Holy Roman Empress and ...
, would also achieve a measure of eminence in teaching and, after 1945, in politics. The sisters would later, jointly, have a secondary school named after them. Luise Torhorst had inherited a useful sum of money as a result of which she was able to see to it that not just her four sons, but also her three daughters, received a full education.[ Marie completed her own schooling at an "Oberlyzeum" (single-sex girls' secondary school).]
Student
Sources are not completely consistent as to when she embarked on her university education, much of which coincided with the First World War
World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...
. She attended the University of Bonn
The University of Bonn, officially the Rhenish Friedrich Wilhelm University of Bonn (), is a public research university in Bonn, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It was founded in its present form as the () on 18 October 1818 by Frederick Willi ...
, studying Geography
Geography (from Ancient Greek ; combining 'Earth' and 'write', literally 'Earth writing') is the study of the lands, features, inhabitants, and phenomena of Earth. Geography is an all-encompassing discipline that seeks an understanding o ...
, Mathematics
Mathematics is a field of study that discovers and organizes methods, Mathematical theory, theories and theorems that are developed and Mathematical proof, proved for the needs of empirical sciences and mathematics itself. There are many ar ...
and Physics
Physics is the scientific study of matter, its Elementary particle, fundamental constituents, its motion and behavior through space and time, and the related entities of energy and force. "Physical science is that department of knowledge whi ...
. There are at least two reference to her having also studied at the University of Göttingen
The University of Göttingen, officially the Georg August University of Göttingen (, commonly referred to as Georgia Augusta), is a Public university, public research university in the city of Göttingen, Lower Saxony, Germany. Founded in 1734 ...
.[It was from ]Bonn
Bonn () is a federal city in the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia, located on the banks of the Rhine. With a population exceeding 300,000, it lies about south-southeast of Cologne, in the southernmost part of the Rhine-Ruhr region. This ...
that in 1918 she received her doctorate: the work was supervised by Hans Hahn. Her dissertation was entitled "Über die Randmenge einfach-zusammenhängender ebener Gebiete":[ a core conclusion has become known among her scholarly admirers as the Carathéodory-Torhorst theorem or, more simply, as the Torhorst theorem.] It might have been thought that her doctorate should have provided a launch pad for a life-long career in the universities sector. There were still vanishingly few women working in high-level academic research at this time, however, and at least one commentator has identified "a lack of confidence in her own mathematical ability" in her autobiography.[ Also, with ]Germany
Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...
economically, militarily and politically broken and on the brink of a year of revolutions in the ports and industrial centres, there was widespread nervousness that Lenin
Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov ( 187021 January 1924), better known as Vladimir Lenin, was a Russian revolutionary, politician and political theorist. He was the first head of government of Soviet Russia from 1917 until Death and state funeral of ...
's so-called October Revolution
The October Revolution, also known as the Great October Socialist Revolution (in Historiography in the Soviet Union, Soviet historiography), October coup, Bolshevik coup, or Bolshevik revolution, was the second of Russian Revolution, two r ...
might yet spread uncontrollably through the European continent. Marie Torhorst's own student record of left-wing political activism was no secret.
She joined the socialist "Studenten-Arbeitsgemeinschaft" (apparently an umbrella group of socialist student associations) in 1917.[ According to one source she passed the exams necessary to qualify her for teaching in state schools in 1919 and 1920.][ Elsewhere it is indicated that she had already attended the "Stift Keppel" in Allenbach, where she successfully completed a two years teacher-training course in her early 20s, between 1903 and 1905.] During the early twentieth century her political record made it hard for her to find a permanent teaching post. She was able to find a part-time teaching position at a Catholic girls' school in Bonn
Bonn () is a federal city in the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia, located on the banks of the Rhine. With a population exceeding 300,000, it lies about south-southeast of Cologne, in the southernmost part of the Rhine-Ruhr region. This ...
, however, and also found work with the university as a university librarian. It was probably in 1922/23 that she completed several terms of study at the "Handelshochschule" (''loosely, "business college"'', at the time being subsumed into the university) in Cologne, studying business administration and economics, following which she received a qualification in teaching business studies.[
]
Teacher
In 1923 Torhorst took on the headship of a private business school for the "Frauenerwerbs- und Ausbildungsverein" (''loosely, "Women's employment and training association"'') in Bremen
Bremen (Low German also: ''Breem'' or ''Bräm''), officially the City Municipality of Bremen (, ), is the capital of the States of Germany, German state of the Bremen (state), Free Hanseatic City of Bremen (), a two-city-state consisting of the c ...
. She continued to lead the business school till 1929.[ She also teamed up with politically like-minded teacher colleagues, during this period, to organise evening courses for young people who had been excluded from ]state schools
A state school, public school, or government school is a primary or secondary school that educates all students without charge. They are funded in whole or in part by taxation and operated by the government of the state. State-funded schools a ...
in the area.
Her political and feminist beliefs had been deeply rooted in Torhorst's personal values and life choices since at least as far back as the First World War
World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...
, but it was only in 1928 that she became a member of the Social Democratic Party (SPD).[ It was in the same year that she joined the "Freie Lehrergewerkschaft Deutschlands" / FLGD, a teachers' trades union committed to socialist principals. There are indications that within the SPD, as a left-wing member of the party, she often found herself out of sympathy with the party leadership.]
Between 1929 and 1933, Marie Torhorst taught and worked as a "Studienrätin" (''loosely, "student counsellor"'') at the Karl Marx School which had been set up in 1921 in Berlin
Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...
-Neukölln
Neukölln (), officially abbreviated Neuk, is one of the twelve boroughs of Berlin. It is located south-east of Berlin's center and stretches from the inner city southward to the border with Brandenburg, encompassing the eponymous quarter of Neu ...
by the education pioneer Fritz Karsen, and then progressively expanded under Karsen's direction during the years that followed. There was much about the school which was considered innovative at the time. In 1929 Karsen took the bold step of turning it into a "Gesamtschule" (''loosely, "comprehensive school"''), intended to educate children displaying the widest possible range of abilities. Another appealing feature for Torhorst was an underpinning philosophy which insisted that academically talented working class children should have the same opportunities as the children of more prosperous and/or well educated parents to pass the "Abitur" (secondary school final exam). The significance of the "Abitur
''Abitur'' (), often shortened colloquially to ''Abi'', is a qualification granted at the end of secondary education in Germany. It is conferred on students who pass their final exams at the end of ISCED 3, usually after twelve or thirteen year ...
" in Germany
Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...
was (and is) that passing it opens the way to university-level education. Torhorst's four years at the school included, in 1932, a six month study trip to the Soviet Union
The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...
. Her half year in the Soviet Union left a lasting impression.
The early 1930s were marked by an intensification of Germany's political polarisation. In the Reichstag (parliament) this was reflected in political deadlock
In politics, gridlock or deadlock or political stalemate is a situation when there is difficulty passing laws that satisfy the needs of the people. A government is gridlocked when the ratio between bills passed and the agenda of the legislatur ...
. In January 1933 the Hitler government took power and rapidly transformed Germany into a one-party
A party is a gathering of people who have been invited by a Hospitality, host for the purposes of socializing, conversation, recreation, or as part of a festival or other commemoration or celebration of a special occasion. A party will oft ...
dictatorship
A dictatorship is an autocratic form of government which is characterized by a leader, or a group of leaders, who hold governmental powers with few to no Limited government, limitations. Politics in a dictatorship are controlled by a dictator, ...
. A progressive school in a traditionally left-wing district of Berlin named in honour of Karl Marx
Karl Marx (; 5 May 1818 – 14 March 1883) was a German philosopher, political theorist, economist, journalist, and revolutionary socialist. He is best-known for the 1848 pamphlet '' The Communist Manifesto'' (written with Friedrich Engels) ...
was, unsurprisingly, high on the National Socialist hate list. Bernhard Rust
Bernhard Rust (30 September 1883 – 8 May 1945) was Minister of Science, Education and National Culture ('' Reichserziehungsminister'') in Nazi Germany. Claudia Koonz, ''The Nazi Conscience'', p 134 A combination of school administrator and ze ...
was installed as acting Prussian Minister for the Arts and Education on 4 February 1933 (following the dismissal of his predecessor in the office), and on 21 February 1933 Rust dismissed Karsen from the headship of his own school. The teaching staff were dismissed, and when the school reopened later that year it was with a new name, a new set of teachers, and a large swastika flag hanging in the main hall. Karsen emigrated. Marie Torhorst's teaching career was evidently over.[
]
Twelve years of Hitler
As soon as Hitler took power Marie's older sister, Adelheid
Adelheid is the modern Dutch and German form of the Old High German female given name Adalheid, meaning "nobility" or "noble-ness". It may refer to the following people:
* Saint Adelheid or Adelaide of Italy, (931–999), Holy Roman Empress and ...
, emigrated to the Netherlands
, Terminology of the Low Countries, informally Holland, is a country in Northwestern Europe, with Caribbean Netherlands, overseas territories in the Caribbean. It is the largest of the four constituent countries of the Kingdom of the Nether ...
and stayed there for the next twelve years. In 1934 she embarked on a six month marriage of convenience with a man called Jacob
Jacobs. Her own resulting change of name, from Adelheid Torhorst to Adelheid Jacobs, turned out to have been prescient. After the German army
The German Army (, 'army') is the land component of the armed forces of Federal Republic of Germany, Germany. The present-day German Army was founded in 1955 as part of the newly formed West German together with the German Navy, ''Marine'' (G ...
invaded the Netherlands in 1940, her new name protected her from Nazi persecution.[ The two sisters had always been close, both politically engaged, both teachers, both unmarried and childless. But Marie Torhorst chose a different course and stayed in ]Germany
Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...
. As far as her public self was concerned, hr first job after losing her teaching position was as a catering assistant. She later found a job as an appointments administrator at the Berlin University
The Humboldt University of Berlin (, abbreviated HU Berlin) is a public research university in the central borough of Mitte in Berlin, Germany.
The university was established by Frederick William III on the initiative of Wilhelm von Humboldt ...
Hygiene Institute, and another as a typist in the travel office correspondence section of an American Express
American Express Company or Amex is an American bank holding company and multinational financial services corporation that specializes in payment card industry, payment cards. It is headquartered at 200 Vesey Street, also known as American Expr ...
(AMEXCO) branch. She was, in addition, entitled to receive a pension in respect of the six years during which she had worked as head of a private business school in Bremen between 1923 and 1929, but this pension was payable by the "Reichsversicherungsanstalt", a government agency. It was not paid to her. According to her own understanding set out in a letter to a friend at the time, changes to the law implemented in 1934/35 meant that she was unable to litigate the matter. In addition to her day jobs, Torhorst gave every sign of being part of the new social order emerging in Germany. Between 1935 and 1940 she was a registered member both of the German Labour Front
The German Labour Front (, ; DAF) was the national labour organization of the Nazi Party, which replaced the various independent trade unions in Germany during the process of ''Gleichschaltung'' or Nazification.
History
As early as March 1933, ...
and of the German Red Cross
The German Red Cross (GRC) ( ; DRK) is the national Red Cross Society in Germany.
During the Nazi era, the German Red Cross was under the control of the Nazi Party and played a role in supporting the regime's policies, including the exclusion ...
.[
According to her own detailed, albeit largely uncorroborated, records she was also a member of other organisations that operated, as far as possible, out of the sight of the ]homeland security
Homeland security is an American national security term for "the national effort to ensure a homeland that is safe, secure, and resilient against terrorism and other hazards where American interests, aspirations, and ways of life can thrive" to ...
. As soon as she lost her teaching job at beginning of 1933 she became an activist member of "Parole", a locally based resistance group in Berlin
Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...
-Neukölln
Neukölln (), officially abbreviated Neuk, is one of the twelve boroughs of Berlin. It is located south-east of Berlin's center and stretches from the inner city southward to the border with Brandenburg, encompassing the eponymous quarter of Neu ...
. In this group, together with former pupils from the progressive school at which she had taught between 1929 and 1933, she produced an underground anti-government newspaper, also called "Parole". There are indications that she was also involved in underground political discussion groups, and in smuggling out information about conditions in Germany to the exiled Communist Party leadership groups that had ended up after 1933 in Paris, Prague and Moscow, using her communications with her sister in the Netherlands as a conduit.[
The authorities seem to have known (or suspected) that the teachers who had lost their jobs when the Karl Marx School in ]Neukölln
Neukölln (), officially abbreviated Neuk, is one of the twelve boroughs of Berlin. It is located south-east of Berlin's center and stretches from the inner city southward to the border with Brandenburg, encompassing the eponymous quarter of Neu ...
had been taken over would (or might) have kept in touch and formed some sort of a resistance organisation. Marie Torhorst was first called in for questioning by the Gestapo
The (, ), Syllabic abbreviation, abbreviated Gestapo (), was the official secret police of Nazi Germany and in German-occupied Europe.
The force was created by Hermann Göring in 1933 by combining the various political police agencies of F ...
in 1937. She was accused of undertaking political work for the (by now illegal) SPD, but she was able to refute the accusation and was released, presumably "for lack of evidence". War
War is an armed conflict between the armed forces of states, or between governmental forces and armed groups that are organized under a certain command structure and have the capacity to sustain military operations, or between such organi ...
broke out
Out or OUT may refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media
Films
*Out (1957 film), ''Out'' (1957 film), a documentary short about the Hungarian Revolution of 1956
*Out (1982 film), ''Out'' (1982 film), an American film directed by Eli Hollander
*O ...
in September 1939. Within Germany, government persecution of political opponents and of Jews intensified progressively till the Shoah
The Holocaust (), known in Hebrew language, Hebrew as the (), was the genocide of History of the Jews in Europe, European Jews during World War II. From 1941 to 1945, Nazi Germany and Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy ...
reached its brutish nadir in 1942
The Uppsala Conflict Data Program project estimates this to be the deadliest year in human history in terms of conflict deaths, placing the death toll at 4.62 million. However, the Correlates of War estimates that the prior year, 1941, was th ...
. During this time Marie Torhorst concealed one of her former pupils and his mother, also providing the two of them with food. The young man was in particular danger from the government, since he was both Jewish and a Communist. At some point during 1943 someone informed the authorities of the situation. Sources are silent over what happened to the people she had been hiding, but Marie Torhorst herself was detained and taken to the " Hallendorf labour camp" by Watenstedt, near Braunschweig
Braunschweig () or Brunswick ( ; from Low German , local dialect: ) is a List of cities and towns in Germany, city in Lower Saxony, Germany, north of the Harz Mountains at the farthest navigable point of the river Oker, which connects it to the ...
. Given the personal network that she would have acquired during her teaching career, and given her strong political and social opinions, it is likely that Torhorst will have responded to many opportunities to help victims and potential victims of government persecution between 1933 and 1945, and commentators bemoan the lack of relevant research undertaken on the details of resistance activism in Berlin and other German cities. However, many of the actions involved will have depended on maximum secrecy to have been effective, and it therefore seems likely that most of the details will remain unknown.[
Before the war ended Torhorst had been released from the labour camp and returned to Berlin. Here she returned to the job in the archives department job with the "Deutsche Gesellschaft für Betriebswirtschaft" (''loosely, "German Society for Business Administration"'') in which she had already been employed between 1939 and her arrest in 1943.] During the final months of the war she was also involved in looking after German prisoners of War under the auspices of the "Reichsgruppe Handwerk" (a government backed craftworkers' organisation).
1945 and new beginnings
The end of the war in May 1945 marked an end to the Hitler nightmare and new beginnings for millions of Germans. There were choices to be made. The western two thirds of Germany had ended up divided into four military occupation zones, administered respectively by the British, the Americans, the French and the Soviets. The region surrounding Berlin, along with the ruins and rubble comprising eastern part of the city itself, were administered as the Soviet occupation zone
The Soviet occupation zone in Germany ( or , ; ) was an area of Germany that was occupied by the Soviet Union as a communist area, established as a result of the Potsdam Agreement on 2 August 1945. On 7 October 1949 the German Democratic Republ ...
. Torhorst had spent the Hitler years based in Berlin and she now made her choice: she joined the (no longer outlawed) Communist Party in or before January 1946.
She was actively engaged in various education related functions from the middle part of 1945. Between August 1945 and July 1946 she took charge at the department in charge of teacher training for the education department of Greater Berlin
The Greater Berlin Act (), officially Law Regarding the Creation of the New Municipality of Berlin (), was a law passed by the Prussian state government in 1920, which greatly expanded the size of the Prussian and German capital of Berlin.
Hist ...
. In April 1946 a new political party was created in the Soviet occupation zone
The Soviet occupation zone in Germany ( or , ; ) was an area of Germany that was occupied by the Soviet Union as a communist area, established as a result of the Potsdam Agreement on 2 August 1945. On 7 October 1949 the German Democratic Republ ...
by means of a contentious political merger between the Communist Party and the Social Democratic Party
The name Social Democratic Party or Social Democrats has been used by many political parties in various countries around the world. Such parties are most commonly aligned to social democracy as their political ideology.
Active parties
Form ...
. It is probable that the architects of this arrangement intended that it should take effect across all four occupation zones, but as matters turned out the Socialist Unity Party (''"Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands"'' / SED) never gained traction outside the Soviet zone. Nevertheless, in East Berlin Marie Torhorst was one of hundreds of thousands of Communist Party members who lost no time in signing their party memberships over to what became, over the next few years, the ruling party in a new kind of German one-party dictatorship. The party unification congress of April 1946 also saw a widespread transfer of political powers over various aspects of daily life, including education, to the control of the new Party. Marie Torhorst meanwhile emerged as a true believer in the new order. She saw herself as an intellectual-worker, determined to support the building of a new Germany, truly socialist in spirit and vision. After twelve years of Hitler, actions for the creation of an antifascist future must be genuine, and not just a matter for empty rhetoric. The political beliefs which she had developed and by which she had lived under the German Republic before 1933 provided a sound basis on which, under the Soviet military administration, it would be possible develop and apply her ideas for the education system. It now became apparent just how much she had been impressed by Soviet education during her six month study visit to Moscow in 1932. Towards the end of 1946 she held a meeting with Fritz Karsen, the education pioneer at whose school she had worked as a teacher between 1929 and 1933. He was back in (west) Berlin, now working for the US military administration as an education officer. When he asked Torhorst how it could be possible to work only "under Russian pressure", she replied that she had never felt "so free and happy". Now she found she could "join in with the creation of everything that she had always strived to achieve as a teacher, without having to make any of those fundamental comprises".[
]
Nation building
Between May 1945 and October 1949 the Soviet occupation zone
The Soviet occupation zone in Germany ( or , ; ) was an area of Germany that was occupied by the Soviet Union as a communist area, established as a result of the Potsdam Agreement on 2 August 1945. On 7 October 1949 the German Democratic Republ ...
underwent a carefully choreographed nation building programme based on plans many of which had, as it turned out, been devised in some detail in Moscow
Moscow is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns in Russia by population, largest city of Russia, standing on the Moskva (river), Moskva River in Central Russia. It has a population estimated at over 13 million residents with ...
between 1941 and 1945 by the men who now held the levers of power (subject to Soviet supervision). On 29 May 1947 Torhorst was chosen to serve as "Minister for People's Education" in the state of Thuringia
Thuringia (; officially the Free State of Thuringia, ) is one of Germany, Germany's 16 States of Germany, states. With 2.1 million people, it is 12th-largest by population, and with 16,171 square kilometers, it is 11th-largest in area.
Er ...
. It was a remarkable development.[ The recently launched women's weekly magazine "Die Frau von heute" carried her portrait on its front page, accompanied by the headline "Frauen als Minister ..... abeDeutschland noch nicht gesehen" (''loosely, "Women as ministers .... a new experience for Germany"'' There was a brief article spelling out that her appointment was justified by "long years of specialist knowledge", but also acknowledging that "as a woman she ... ould beexposed to exceptional levels of criticism". Nevertheless, "for all the women in the east" the appointment represented a melting away of the former indifference over women being able to determine their own futures. Even though it had in the past been the case that "a few thousand of her gender-comrades, who came from the more favourably positioned classes, found their way into some of the higher professions, such as medicine, academic life or equivalent levels in public service", Torhorst's appointment as a minister showed that "the whole situation for the female gender has changed fundamentally, since their equality of value and equality of entitlement with men" was officially recognised, and thereby their "gender-subservience" had been done away with.][Steinschen, H.G.: Frau Minister, in: Für Dich 24 (1947), Titelblatt.]
Torhorst herself also used the press to share with comrades some of her ambitions for her new role. These included the necessity "to bring an end to the still major differences between urban and rural schooling provision". She also shared her opinion that there was "still much more to be done to lay down a genuinely democratic basis for the development of a highly qualified and progressive German intelligentsia". Indispensable to that ambition was "a substantial increase in the proportion of university students with working class backgrounds". She would therefore make it her top priority to ensure that "the treasures of culture and learning do not simply benefit a small number of comrades at the top of society".[ An interesting insight into her education philosophy as minister comes from a surviving record of a "conversation" that Torhorst held with an American delegation on 27 June 1947, shortly after her appointment to ministerial office: "The most important work ... would be implementation of the law to democratise German schools". In this connection " Unity schools must be implemented in the Soviet zone".][
There was a strong, if ill-defined, expectation on both sides of what would become known as the "]inner German border
The inner German border ( or ''deutsch–deutsche Grenze''; initially also , zonal boundary) was the frontier between the East Germany, German Democratic Republic (GDR, East Germany) and the West Germany, Federal Republic of Germany (FRG, West ...
" that the four military occupation zones of Germany would at some stage be rehabilitated and unified into a single post-fascist state, but visions of how such a state would be governed differed starkly, especially after 1948
Events January
* January 1
** The General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) is inaugurated.
** The current Constitutions of Constitution of Italy, Italy and of Constitution of New Jersey, New Jersey (both later subject to amendment) ...
. During the twelve month Berlin blockade thoughts of any future German reunification disappeared over the horizon, and in October 1949 the Soviet zone was relaunched as the Soviet sponsored German Democratic Republic (East Germany). It was also during 1949 that Adelheid
Adelheid is the modern Dutch and German form of the Old High German female given name Adalheid, meaning "nobility" or "noble-ness". It may refer to the following people:
* Saint Adelheid or Adelaide of Italy, (931–999), Holy Roman Empress and ...
returned from the Netherlands and moved in with Marie. The two sisters, still unmarried, childless, and still – in their different ways – deeply engaged in the politics of education, made their home together in Weimar
Weimar is a city in the state (Germany), German state of Thuringia, in Central Germany (cultural area), Central Germany between Erfurt to the west and Jena to the east, southwest of Leipzig, north of Nuremberg and west of Dresden. Together w ...
, which till 1952 was the seat of the state government
A state government is the government that controls a subdivision of a country in a federal form of government, which shares political power with the federal or national government. A state government may have some level of political autonom ...
for Thuringia
Thuringia (; officially the Free State of Thuringia, ) is one of Germany, Germany's 16 States of Germany, states. With 2.1 million people, it is 12th-largest by population, and with 16,171 square kilometers, it is 11th-largest in area.
Er ...
.[ In 1950 Marie Torhorst lost her position as Thuringian Minister for People's Education. Significantly Isolde Oschmann, her successor, appointed only in 1951, was another woman. Isolde Oschmann was a former Kindergarten teacher who turned out to be very much less of a hands-on education minister that Torhorst had been: her footprint on East German history remained slight despite her having held ministerial office for more than a year.] It remains unclear why Marie Torhorst was replaced in the role.[Baumgartner, Gabriele; Hebig, Dieter (Hrsg.): Biografisches Handbuch der SBZ/DDR, München 1997, p. 937.] There is no very obvious indication from her subsequent public career that she was among those who fell out of favour with the party leadership at this time.
Ex-minister
Torhorst then served, briefly during 1951/52, as political secretary with the East Berlin
East Berlin (; ) was the partially recognised capital city, capital of East Germany (GDR) from 1949 to 1990. From 1945, it was the Allied occupation zones in Germany, Soviet occupation sector of Berlin. The American, British, and French se ...
office of the "Internationale Demokratische Frauenföderation" (IDFF / ''"Women's International Democratic Federation"''). She also accepted an invitation from Paul Wandel, East Germany's Minister for Education, to take over the running of the important "Arts Exhibition of the People's Republic of China" which was held in East Berlin during 1950/51.
In 1952 she joined the East German Education Ministry as head of the department for cultural relations with foreign countries, a position she retained till 1957. Between 1958 and 1962 she taught at the (East) German National Pedagogical Institute, where in 1962 she also accepted a professorship. Through the 1950s and early 1960s Torhorst held a number of other, mostly short-term and part-time complementary appointments relating to her educational experience and expertise. Beyond the world of education, she also served between 1957 and 1960 as an honorary deputy president of the "Demokratischer Frauenbund Deutschlands" (DFD / "(East) German Democratic Women's League". After 1964, the year of her seventy-sixth birthday, she continued to engage actively in education related projects and discussions, but now on a free-lance basis.[
Marie Torhorst died in East Berlin on 7 May 1989. Despite her considerable age, she was very far from forgotten at the time of her death. There were obituaries both from the East German ministry of Education and from the Central Committee. She had lived out her final years in a special retirement home set aside for "party veterans".]
Stasi links
After reunification
A political union is a type of political entity which is composed of, or created from, smaller politics or the process which achieves this. These smaller polities are usually called federated states and federal territories in a federal govern ...
it emerged that Marie Torhorst had been a longstanding and active Secret Informant for the Ministry for State security. When the Stasi files were investigated, her earliest surviving report was found to date from 1953. Most Stasi informants produced reports on the daily movements and conversations of their work colleagues and / or family members, but Torhorst had been targeted and recruited after it was noticed, from routine monitoring of her personal letters, that she had excellent contacts with a number of persons of interest on the far side of the "inner German border
The inner German border ( or ''deutsch–deutsche Grenze''; initially also , zonal boundary) was the frontier between the East Germany, German Democratic Republic (GDR, East Germany) and the West Germany, Federal Republic of Germany (FRG, West ...
". No doubt it was considered useful that she was always herself a compulsive writer of long detailed letters to friends and contacts. On account of her links to the East German government she also enjoyed exceptional travel privileges at a time when East Germany was becoming became ever more physically isolated from the west. Those on whom she submitted reports included her cousin, the respected professor of church law Rudolf Smend
Rudolf Smend (November 5, 1851 – December 27, 1913)--"the Elder"-- was a German theologian born in Lengerich, Westphalia. He was an older brother to theologian Julius Smend (1857–1930), and the father of Carl Friedrich Rudolf Smend (1882–1 ...
, the popular historian Wolfgang Leonhardt and the journalist Stephan Grzeskowiak. (Stephan Grzeskowiak was, in addition, one of Torhorst's former pupils from her time as a teacher at the Karl Marx School in Neukölln during the early 1930s and, more recently, had been a party insider with the team surrounding Kurt Schumacher
Curt Ernst Carl Schumacher, better known as Kurt Schumacher (13 October 1895 – 20 August 1952), was a German politician and resistance fighter against the Nazis. He was chairman of the Social Democratic Party of Germany from 1946 and the fir ...
, the recently deceased leader if the SPD in the west
West is a cardinal direction or compass point.
West or The West may also refer to:
Geography and locations
Global context
* The Western world
* Western culture and Western civilization in general
* The Western Bloc, countries allied with NAT ...
. His ongoing links, as a journalist, with SPD politicians in Bonn
Bonn () is a federal city in the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia, located on the banks of the Rhine. With a population exceeding 300,000, it lies about south-southeast of Cologne, in the southernmost part of the Rhine-Ruhr region. This ...
during the 1950s, 60s and 70s were of particular interest to Torhorst's Stasi handlers.)[Wolfgang Buschfort: Marie Torhorst – die erste deutsche Ministerin. In: Andrea Gawrich, Hans J. Lietzmann (Hrsg.): "Gute Politik" und ihre Zeit, Münster 2005, pp. 246–255] In 1958 her Stasi handlers marked the seventieth birthday of "GI Sophie" (the codename by which she was identified in the files) with a hamper worth 75 (western) marks
Marks may refer to:
Business
* Mark's, a Canadian retail chain
* Marks & Spencer, a British retail chain
* Collective trade marks
A collective trademark, collective trade mark, or collective mark is a trademark owned by an organization (such ...
, accompanied by a note commending the way in which she had "fulfilled all her assignments in an exemplary manner ... nd showeda keen of interest in he Stasi'swork". It does appear that her reports were not just long, but also both detailed and, at times, remarkably "readable" and even "chatty". She was indeed unusual among Stasi informants in her willingness to submit unsolicited advice, for instance concerning books from the west which should probably not be permitted to circulate in East Germany, or ways in which East German radio programmes might more effectively counter the "western propaganda" broadcast by the U.S. backed RIAS (radio station) from West Berlin. After her seventieth birthday a regular "secret collaborative relationship" was deemed no longer appropriate on account of her age, but she continued to receive "official visits" and her advice continued to be solicited, according to the reports of her Stasi handler at the time, Officer
An officer is a person who has a position of authority in a hierarchical organization. The term derives from Old French ''oficier'' "officer, official" (early 14c., Modern French ''officier''), from Medieval Latin ''officiarius'' "an officer," fro ...
Hüther.
Notes
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Torhorst, Marie
1888 births
1989 deaths
People from Tecklenburg
People from Bremen (city)
University of Bonn alumni
University of Cologne alumni
20th-century German educators
German mathematicians
German women mathematicians
German feminists
Social Democratic Party of Germany politicians
Communist Party of Germany politicians
Socialist Unity Party of Germany politicians
Recipients of the Patriotic Order of Merit (honor clasp)