Hermann Raster

Hermann Raster (1827–1891) was a German American Forty-Eighter, best known for his career as chief editor for the Illinois Staats-Zeitung between 1867 and 1891 and his brief term as Collector of Internal Revenue for the 1st District of Illinois.^[2]

Early life

Raster was born in Zerbst, Anhalt-Dessau on May 6, 1827 to a family of aristocrats. His father, statesman Christian Raster was the Administrative Officer and close friend of the Duke of Anhalt, Leopold IV. Hermann was one of eight children, his siblings in order being Luise, Alexander, Wilhelm, Gustav, (then Hermann) Askan, Wolfgang, and Sophie. Christian insisted young Hermann learned English and had a tutor brought from England to teach him. By the time Hermann was an adult he was fluent in seven languages. He graduated from the University of Leipzig in 1846 and then the University of Berlin in 1848. In 1849 he took a job as the stenographer of the Anhalt Legislature. Raster joined the Revolutions of 1848 in which he wrote articles and pamphlets against the monarchy and the church. Later that year he was forced to flee Germany to America with fellow revolutionaries to escape prison.

New York

Hermann arrived in New York in July, 1851 and first found employment as a farmhand near Tioga, Pennsylvania. He left for Buffalo in the spring of 1852, accepting the position of editor for the Buffalo Demokrat. His journalistic reputation grew quickly and in February 1853, Raster was made editor of the New York Abendzeitung, the most influential German-language paper of the time. He had a wife, Emilia Berta Hahn Raster, born in 1836, and a daughter, Mathilde, with her in 1857. While living in New York, he became an active member of the Republican Party. In 1856, he became an elector in the 1856 presidential election. Raster was influential in leading the German-American switch to the Republican Party in 1856, swaying German public opinion via his pro-union, anti-slavery articles in the German press, and promoting the personal liberty cause. He was a very strong supporter of Abraham Lincoln and helped convince the German and European communities to vote Republican.

Chicago and Later Life

In 1867, Raster accepted the position as editor for the Illinois Staats-Zeitung in Chicago, where he remained until his death. In 1871 Hermann was given the position as Collector of Internal Revenue for the First Illinois District by President Ulysses S. Grant.^[3] In 1872, Raster resigned from the position as Collector of Internal Revenue to save more time for the paper and help campaign for Grant in the upcoming election. That same year at the National Republican Convention in Philadelphia inserted the "Raster Resolution" in its platform which greatly opposed the Temperance movement. Raster held so much influence over the German republican community he once threatened to leave the party if Prohibition was not made an issue and the resolution not passed and with him the entire German-American Republican community. During the Haymarket Affair, Raster was trying to delegate the rioters before he left the scene when he realized any hope for the situation was lost. Once the perpetrators were caught he wrote a letter to the Governor, John Peter Altgeld demanding that the prisoners be put to death. He blamed the recent German "immigrant radicals" for the issues at hand and suggested immigration reforms be made, stating, "Unfortunately it is from the German Reich that these bloody scoundrels, these socialists, communists, and anarchists have come."^[4] Raster died on July 24, 1891 in Dresden where he had traveled for his poor health. His daughter Mathilde (1857-unknown) and his third wife Margarethe (1848-1908) and their three children, Anna Sophie Hercz (1874-1936), Edwin Otto Raster 1871-1926) and Walther Berthold Raster (1875-1944) survived him. He had one of the largest public funerals ever held in Chicago. Hermann Raster was interned at Graceland Cemetery on August 13, 1891, where his grave remains today.

In 1891, Raster's family and friends published a novel filled with his travel papers and biography, called "Reisebriefe von Hermann Raster".

References