Merkel, Kurt Heinz

Merkel was born into a working-class family, after graduating from a public school, received a commercial education and worked as a seller in a food wholesale store in Hamburg. In 1937-1939 he headed the branch. In 1938 he joined the NSDAP . In 1939-1945 he served in the rank of sergeant major in the 154th Wehrmacht grenadier regiment.

At the end of the war in 1946 he joined the SED . In 1946-1949 he worked as an employee in consumer cooperation in Zeitz and Querfurt . He managed the store and school of the Trade Organization in Zeitz. In 1950 he was elected to the district assembly of Zeitz. In 1951-1952 he studied at the German Academy of State and Legal Sciences , after which he worked as the head of department and the head of the office, as well as the deputy general director of the German Society for Internal and Foreign Trade in Food. Then, in 1954, he headed the working group at the Ministry of Foreign and Internal German Trade of the GDR. In 1956-1959, he served as Deputy Minister of Foreign and Intra-German Trade of the GDR. In 1959-1963 he worked in the Ministry of Trade and Supply of the GDR, first as a state secretary, and from July 1959 to October 1963 - minister. Subsequently received a higher economic education. From April 1969 to February 1988, he served as Director of the District Directorate of the Trade Organization in East Berlin .

• Olaf Kappelt: Braunbuch DDR. Nazis in der DDR . Elisabeth Reichmann Verlag, Berlin 1981, S. 300.
• Manfred Bliefernich: Merkel, Curt-Heinz . In: Gabriele Baumgartner, Dieter Hebig (Hrsg.): Biographisches Handbuch der SBZ / DDR. 1945-1990 . Band 2. KG Saur, München 1997, ISBN 3-598-11177-0 , S. 535.

• Biography (German)