Angela Dorothea Kasner, better known as Angela Merkel, was born in Hamburg, West Germany, on July 17, 1954. Trained as a physicist, Merkel entered politics after the 1989 fall of the Berlin Wall. Rising to the position of Chairwoman of the Christian Democratic Union party, Merkel became Germany’s first female chancellor, and one of the leading figures of the European Union, following the 2005 national elections.
Early Years
German stateswoman and chancellor Angela Merkel was born July 17, 1954 in Hamburg, Germany. The daughter of a Lutheran pastor and teacher, Merkel grew up in a rural area north of Berlin in the then German Democratic Republic. She studied physics at the University of Leipzig, earning a doctorate in 1978, and later worked as a chemist at the Central Institute for Physical Chemistry, Academy of Sciences (1978–1990).
First Female Chancellor
In 1990 she joined the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) political party and soon after was appointed to Helmut Kohl‘s cabinet as minister for women and youth. Following his defeat in the 1998 general election, she was named Secretary-General of the CDU. She was chosen party leader in 2000 and ran unsuccessfully for chancellor in 2002. In the 2005 election she narrowly defeated Chancellor Gerhard Schröder, winning by just three seats, and after the CDU agreed a coalition deal with the Social Democrats (SPD), she was declared Germany’s first female chancellor. Merkel is also the first former citizen of the German Democratic Republic to lead the reunited Germany and the first woman to lead Germany since it became a modern nation-state in 1871.
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• Raised: Templin, East Germany, a town of 17,000 one hour from Berlin
• Father: Horst Kasner, a theologian and Lutheran minister
• Mother: Herlind Kasner, an English and Latin teacher
• Marriages: Ulrich Merkel (1977-82, divorced); Joachim Sauer, a chemistry professor (1998-present)
• Children: None. Her husband has two sons from a previous marriage.
• Education: Graduated from University of Leipzig in 1978 with a degree in physics and physical chemistry; earned a PhD in quantum chemistry from the German Academy of Sciences in Berlin in 1986
• Religion: Lutheran
• Science career: 1978-90 – studied and worked as a researcher at the German Academy of Sciences
• Political career: 1989 – became active in politics after the fall of the Berlin Wall; 1990 – named press officer for the political party Democratic Awakening and briefly served as a spokeswoman for a caretaker pre-reunification East German government; elected to the Bundestag in first election after reunification; 1991 – Chancellor Helmut Kohl appoints her to his cabinet as Minister of Women and Young People; 1994 – named Minister of the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety; 1998 – becomes general secretary of the Christian Democratic Union; 2005 – becomes first woman chancellor of Germany, the first chancellor born after World War II, and the first from the former East Germany; 2009 – is reelected chancellor of Germany
• Miscellany: Is an avid soccer fan. Says she needs only a few hours of sleep a night, provided she can catch up on the weekend. Once flunked a physics class – and later chose the field as her first career. Has a wry sense of humor and likes to mimic world leaders she’s met with, including Vladimir Putin and George W. Bush. Often referred to as “Mutti,” or “Mummy” by Germans. Husband is sometimes called the “Phantom of the Opera” because he so rarely goes out in public, other than for an annual Wagner festival.