Magistratsdirektor Dr. Rudolf Josef Hießmanseder

Rudolf Josef Hießmanseder [also Hiessmanseder] was born in Vienna as the legitimate son of glass merchant Leopold Eduard Hießmanseder and his wife Maria, née Laska. After elementary school, he attended the Imperial and Royal State Gymnasium in Oberhollabrunn. His education was made possible by a scholarship from the Lower Austrian Governor’s Office. In 1900, he graduated from high school and enrolled in law at the University of Vienna. That same year, he joined the Norica fraternity.

Rudolf Hießmanseder earned his doctorate in law in 1905 and began working at the District Administrative Office for Vienna’s 2nd District. In 1906, he completed his military service. In 1908, he was involved in the founding of the Marco-Danubia and Franco-Bavaria fraternities and became a member of both a year later. He proposed the name “Franco-Bavaria.”

Rudolf Hießmanseder was not drafted into World War I due to his health. During the war, he served as Vienna’s representative in the Lower Austrian Public Education Office and as a member of the executive board of the Public Clothing Office of the Lower Austrian Governor’s Office. In 1917, he transferred to the Municipal Economic Office (MA 44), and on June 13, 1922, he was appointed its director. In 1922, he married Emma Hafner, and in 1923, he became the father of a daughter. Following the death of Emma Hafner in January 1924, he married her sister, Margarethe Hafner, in September of that same year and became the father of a son in 1925.

As a result of the partial uprising by the Social Democratic Republican Protection League on February 12, 1934, the mayor, the remaining Social Democratic members of the City Senate and the Vienna Provincial Government, and the top Social Democratic officials were dismissed. On February 13, 1934, Federal Chancellor Engelbert Dollfuß—who would be assassinated by the National Socialists during an attempted coup in July of that same year—appointed Richard Schmitz as Federal Commissioner for the City of Vienna (he would later become mayor). On the same day, Rudolf Hießmanseder was appointed by Richard Schmitz as Director of the City Administration—and thus the highest-ranking official of the City of Vienna. He was also a member of the Fatherland Front.

This staunch Austrian, devout Catholic, and resolute opponent of National Socialism witnessed on March 12, 1938, the downfall of a free and independent Austria with the invasion of the German Wehrmacht. He was dismissed without notice on March 13, 1938—one day after the occupation of Austria—and was placed in protective custody by the Gestapo between May 26, 1938, and June 4, 1938. On November 18, 1938, at his request, his dismissal without notice was converted to a compulsory retirement with reduced pay. He remained true to his Austrian patriotic convictions.

He died at the age of 60 due to a heart condition and was laid to rest at the cemetery in Vienna-Inzersdorf.

His son, who, like his father, is named Rudolf Hießmanseder, was later drafted and seriously wounded in the war. He witnessed the liberation of Austria and the restoration of the republic in April and May 1945, respectively, and, as a student, joined the Norica fraternity, just as his father had.

His widow, Margarete Hießmanseder, also witnessed the liberation of Austria and the restoration of the republic, and joined the newly founded Austrian People’s Party (ÖVP) and the ÖVP Association of the Politically Persecuted and Defenders of Austria. She died in 1989, outliving her husband by 47 years.