This memorial stele is dedicated to Franz Itting, the builder of the People's House in Probstzella. Itting, born in 1875 in Saalfeld and died in 1967 in Ludwigsstadt, was an industrial pioneer in Thuringia. In 1909, he built a power plant in Probstzella that supplied more than 100 communities with electricity. He also made a name for himself through his social commitment, building housing for his workers and establishing the People's House as a cultural center.
The avowed Social Democrat was politically harassed during the Nazi era as "Red Itting" and imprisoned in a concentration camp. After the end of the war, the industrialist Itting was considered a capitalist class enemy in the communist GDR and was imprisoned again in 1948. After his release and the dispossession of his family, he moved to Ludwigsstadt in Franconia in 1950 at the age of 74.
A request by the heirs for the return of the former properties after German reunification was rejected by the Thuringian State Office for Property Issues in 2000. Reversal of the expropriation was not possible due to Soviet occupation law.
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