Philipp Scheidemann

Philipp Scheidemann was born on 26 July 1865 and rose through the Social Democratic Party to become one of its leading figures by the early 20th century. When Germany's defeat in World War I triggered revolution in 1918-1919, he proclaimed a German Republic from the Reichstag balcony, a spontaneous act that shaped the country's political rupture. In 1919, the National Assembly meeting in Weimar elected him Reich Minister President, but he resigned within months after the cabinet fractured over whether to accept the Treaty of Versailles. He stayed in the Reichstag until 1933 and served as mayor of Kassel from 1920 to 1925. When Hitler took power in 1933, Scheidemann fled into exile - the Nazis branded him a "November criminal" responsible for the empire's collapse. He wrote extensively about German politics from abroad and died in Copenhagen on 29 November 1939.