Ferdinand Werner

Life & Legacy

Ferdinand Friedrich Karl Werner (27 October 1876 – 5 March 1961) was a German schoolteacher and long-serving politician who held offices during the German Empire, the Weimar Republic and Nazi Germany. Throughout his career, he belonged to several far-right and antisemitic parties. He was a deputy in the Imperial Reichstag from 1911 to 1917, and again in the Republican Reichstag from 1924 to 1928. From 1921 to 1933, he served as a deputy of the Landtag of the People's State of Hesse. In the first year of Nazi Germany he was the first Nazi Party State President and, later, Minister-president of Hesse but was dismissed in a power struggle with Reichsstatthalter (Reich Governor) Jakob Sprenger. He then worked for the Association of German Mountain and Hiking Clubs and as a Hessian state historian.