Hofrat DDr. Gerhard Stepantschitz

Gerhard Stepantschitz visits the Gymnasium in Graz and maturates here in 1935. He then begins the Jus-Studium at the Faculty of Law and State Sciences at the University of Graz, which he completed in 1939 with the doctorate for Dr. iuris. In 1935 he was admitted to the Carolina Graz student association. In 1938, he is also Chairman of the Catholic-German High School in Graz. Here he is significantly involved in the defense of National Socialism.

After that he is arrested and transferred to the police prison in Graz for some time. In 1939 he began studying medicine at the University of Graz, where he completed his doctorate in 1945 before the end of the war.

At the university there is a medical company that doesn't have to go to the front. From this group of students and a group of Catholic pupils, under the decisive influence of the members of the student association Carolina, Gerhard Stepantschitz, with the mafianist patent Bruno Schilling, forms an illegal university community from which Carolina can recruit her “illegal” young people. The meetings take place unnoticed by the Gestapo in private apartments. In the apartment of Gerhard Stepantschitz – he is formally still the head of the dissolved student association Carolina – will be on the 15th. June 1941 Carolina Graz reactivated in secret.

After the fall of Stalingrad, four Carolinen, among them Gerhard Stepantschitz, in the spring of 1943 in a night and fog action in April, try the six metre high “Hitler oak“to eliminate in the operating ring curve: first the tree is to be destroyed by a poison spray, but this is not enough, because it continues to drive – then the oak of a night in April will be liked, although this is a dangerous action for all involved (see also below Gerald Grinschgl and Josef Liegel).

In February 1945 a group, which also belong to Gerhard Stepantschitz and Gerald Gringschgl, rose from Graz to the west. At the end of April they reach the Lungau. Adolf Hitler was on 24. April 1945 Hermann Göring (1893–1946) escaped all his offices and accused him of high treason;Göring is then fixed on the Obersalzberg. On May 7, 1945 he will flee to Mauterndorf “To the castle of my youth” [so Göring]. When Gerhard Stepantschitz learns about it, he sends Gerald Grinschgl to Innsbruck to the active resistance group under Karl Gruberto make a warrant for Hermann Göring. However, this fleees for safety at Schloss Fischborn in the Salzburger Pinzgau. The Lungau is liberated and red-white-red flags welcome the incoming English troops.

During the Second World War, Gerhard Stepantschitz serves as a paramedic on the front in the Soviet Union and in Greece. After the war, he remains in the Lungau and becomes a secondary doctor in Tamsweg. In 1947 he returns to Graz and finds a position as an intern at the Landeskrankenhaus;here he becomes the primary of the IV in 1954. Medical department appointed. In 1977 until his retirement in 1982, he held the position of the medical director of the hospital. 1974–1981 he belongs to the Styrian State Day and is a member of the Federal Council in 1981–1986.