Hofrat Dr. Josef Aigner

Josef Aigner senior attended grammar school in Linz (Petrinum) and went to Graz to study law after graduating in 1904. He was admitted to Carolina on October 18, 1904. After graduating as Doctor iuris in 1909, he entered the service of the Upper Austrian provincial government on July 26, 1909. He took part in the First World War from 1915 to 1918 in Infantry Regiment No. 14 - ultimately as a reserve lieutenant.

After the war, he also became politically active: in 1919 he was a member of the constituent National Assembly, from 1920 to 1934 a member of the National Council and chairman of the Catholic People's Association for Upper Austria; in this capacity, he took over the presidency of the Catholic Congress in Linz in 1923. In 1933/34, he was one of the staunchest supporters of democracy on the Christian Social Party's executive committee. As he rejected the authoritarian course, he was no longer politically active after 1934; he also resigned as chairman of the People's Association.

After the Anschluss, he was dismissed from his position as court councillor on March 14, 1938 and retired on half pay; he was also subjected to house searches. After the assassination attempt on Adolf Hitler on July 20, 1944, he was arrested on August 23, 1944 and held in police custody in Linz until September 5, 1944.