From Simple English Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Konrad Hermann Josef Adenauer
(born 5 January 1876 in
Cologne
; died 19 April 1967 in
Rhondorf
(part of
Bad Honnef
)). From 1949 to 1963 he was the first
Bundeskanzler
(chancellor) of the
Federal Republic of Germany
and from 1951 to 1955 was foreign secretary the same time.
Adenauer was the third of five children of a court secretary in Cologne. His family was
Catholic
. Konrad Adenauer started his political career in 1906 in the city assembly of Cologne. From 1917 to 1933 and again in 1945 he was mayor of Cologne.
Adenauer was a member of the Catholic
Zentrum Party
. When the
Nazi
Party took power he lost his job. At first he worked with the Nazis, but after the
conspiracy
to kill Hitler failed in 1944 he hid for his own safety.
After the war he became mayor of Cologne again, but lost the job after a few months.
In the
Parlamentarischer Rat
of West Germany, he was one of the top politicians and the President. He founded the
CDU
at the same time.
He was important in making
Bonn
the West German capital instead of
Frankfurt am Main
.
In
1949
he was elected as the first Chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany.
He made sure West Germany joined the side of the western
capitalist
countries in the
Cold War
. He also helped West Germany join
NATO
. He was reelected three times.
In 1964 he stopped being chancellor. He was a member of the
Bundestag
until his death at 91 years old.
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