Wilhelm Pieck

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Wilhelm Pieck

Friedrich Wilhelm Reinhold Pieck (January 3, 1876 – September 7, 1960) was a German

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a country in Central Europe. It is bordered to the north by the North Sea, Denmark, and the Baltic Sea; to the east by Poland and the Czech Republic; to the south by Austria and Switzerland; and to the west by France, Luxembourg, Belgium, and the Netherlands....
communist

Communism

Communism is a socioeconomic structure and political ideology that promotes the establishment of an egalitarianism, classlessness, stateless society based on common ownership and control of the means of production and property in general....
and the first and only president of the German Democratic Republic.

Biography
Wilhelm Pieck was born to a coachman in the eastern part of Guben

Guben

Guben is a town on the Lusatian Neisse river in the States of Germany of Brandenburg, Germany. Located in the Spree-Nei?e Districts of Germany, Guben has a population of 22,184 as of 2004....
, Germany

Germany

Poland

Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe. Poland is bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian Enclave and exclave, to the north....
. While he initially went to school to become a carpenter, the combination of world events, determined ideology, and political ambition led Pieck to a life of political activism.

As a carpenter, in 1894 Pieck joined the wood-workers' federation, which steered him towards joining the Social Democratic Party of Germany

Social Democratic Party of Germany

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Encyclopedia

Friedrich Wilhelm Reinhold Pieck (January 3, 1876 – September 7, 1960) was a German

Germany

Communism

Biography

Wilhelm Pieck was born to a coachman in the eastern part of Guben

Guben

Germany

Poland

Social Democratic Party of Germany

The Social Democratic Party of Germany is Germany's oldest political party. After World War II, under the leadership of Kurt Schumacher, the SPD reestablished itself as an ideological party, representing the interests of the working class and the trade unions....
(SPD) the following year. Pieck became the chairman of the party urban district in 1899, and in 1906 became full-time secretary of the SPD. Although the majority of the SPD supported the German government in World War I

World War I

World War I, or the First World War , was a global military conflict which involved the Great powers, organized into two opposing military alliances: the Allies of World War I and the Central Powers....
, Pieck was a member of the party's left wing, which opposed the war. Pieck's openness in doing so led to his arrest and placement in a military prison. After being released, Pieck briefly lived in Amsterdam

Amsterdam

Amsterdam is the Capital of the Netherlands and List of cities in the Netherlands with over 100,000 people of the Netherlands, located in the Provinces of the Netherlands of North Holland in the west of the country....
. Upon his return to Berlin in 1918, Pieck joined the newly-founded Communist Party of Germany

Communist Party of Germany

The Communist Party of Germany was a major political party in Germany between 1918 and 1933, and a minor party in West Germany in the postwar period....
(KPD).

Following the Nazi Party's takeover in 1933, Pieck left Germany for France that same year, then moved to Moscow

Moscow

Moscow is the capital and the largest types of inhabited localities in Russia of the Russian Federation. It is also the largest European cities and metropolitan areas, with the Moscow metropolitan area ranking among the largest urban areas in the world....
, Pieck served the Communist Party in a variety of capacities. From 1938 until 1943, he filled the position of General Secretary of the Communist International. In 1943 Pieck was among the founders of the National Committee for a Free Germany

National Committee for a Free Germany

The National Committee for a Free Germany was a Germany anti-Nazism organization that operated in the Soviet Union during World War II....
(NKFD). The NKFD planned for the future of Germany after World War II

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global military conflict which involved a Participants in World War II, including all of the great powers, organised into two opposing military alliances: the Allies of World War II and the Axis powers....
. At the conclusion of the war in 1945 Pieck returned to Germany with the victorious Red Army.

In 1949 Pieck was elected President of the newly-established German Democratic Republic

German Democratic Republic

The German Democratic Republic was a self-declared socialist state created in the Soviet Zone of occupied Germany and the East Berlin of Allied Occupation Zones in Germany....
(GDR). Pieck served as the only president of the GDR until his death in 1960. Pieck maintained his posts in politics due to Stalin's trust in him.

Pieck lived in Majakowskiring

Majakowskiring

The Majakowskiring is an ellipse-shaped street in the Pankow district of Berlin, Germany, in the Niedersch?nhausen locality. It was famous as the residence of many senior figures in the government of the German Democratic Republic....
29, Pankow

Pankow

Pankow [] is the third Boroughs of Berlin of Berlin. In Berlin's 2001 administrative reform it was merged with the former boroughs of Prenzlauer Berg and Berlin-Wei?ensee; the resulting borough retained the name Pankow....
, East Berlin

East Berlin

East Berlin was the name given to the eastern part of Berlin between 1949 and 1990. It consisted of the Soviet Union Allied Occupation Zones in Germany of Berlin that was established in 1945....
. His daughter, Elly Winter (1898-1987), held various posts in the SED and East German government.