Hermann Esser (1900-1981) entered the Nazi party with Adolf Hitler in 1920, became the editor of the Nazi paper, Völkischer Beobachter, and a Nazi member of the Reichstag. In the early history of the party, he was Hitler's de facto deputy.
Esser was born in Rörmoos, Bavaria. He did service in World War I and was for a short time a Social Democrat.
He was an effective public speaker and was the Nazi party's first chief of propaganda. After the Beer Hall Putsch fiasco, he was excluded from the party, along with Julius Streicher, under the temporary leadership of the Strassers. He was later re-admitted by Hitler and became influential in the reorganisation of the party. From 1929 to 1933, he was the party's floor leader in Munich's city council. Afterwards, he became a member of the Reichstag and Bavaria's minister of economics. From 1939 to the end of the war he served as the undersecretary for tourism in the Reich propaganda ministry.
He died in Munich.
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