Otto Grotewohl was a German politician and the first prime minister of the German Democratic Republic from 1949 until his death in 1964.
Grotewohl was born in the city of Braunschweig onMarch 1894 and his father was a master tailor. Following World War I started his political career as a leader of the Independent Social Democratic Party of Germany and minister in the Free State of Brunswick. In 1922 Grotewohl with the majority of the USPD members joined the Social Democratic Party of Germany and from 1925 was a member of the Reichstag parliament. Dismissed after the Nazi Machtergreifung in 1933 he was imprisoned several times.
Source: Wikipedia