Herbert Reinecker was born on December 24, 1914 in Hagen,
Westphalia, Germany. Herbert was the son of a National Railroad worker. At the
age of 15 worked as a freelancer for the newspaper Hagen, for which he wrote posts. In the Hitler youth program he was
a member of the flyer HJ. In 1935 he was his high school’s editor of the report
issued jointly by the HJ-field leadership Westphalia and the State Youth
Welfare Office Magazine flag in Münster. In 1936, he moved to Berlin and worked
at the Reich Youth Leadership. There he edited a magazine for young people.
With Tobis Film Company, he attended a course for
screenwriters. During the war years he wrote some stage propaganda pieces. As a
war correspondent in the propaganda unit of the Waffen-SS he was sent to
Russia, Flanders and Pomerania. He fell ill at the Ruhr and narrowly escaped
death. 1942 Reinecker was made chief editor of the Hitler Youth Magazines The Pimpf and Young World. In December of the same year his anti-Soviet drama
premiered The Village in Odessa, which describes the fate of ethnic Germans in
the Soviet Union and became one of the most performed plays of the Nazi era.
His screenplay for the youth propaganda film “Young Eagle” in 1944 was filmed
by his friend Alfred Weidenmann.
After the war, his applications were rejected for several
journalist jobs. Reinecker held initially a job as director and sole author of
a press service in the Palatinate. He wrote novels, short stories and a variety
of articles since 1947 texts for the cabaret Ulenspiegel in Cologne. In the
1950s and 1960s Reinecker was in demand as a screenwriter, for the Edgar
Wallace films. He worked with Alfred Weidenmann and their films were awarded
honors. Under the pseudonym Herbert Dührkopp also emerged from 1951 radio plays
for the NWDR. In 1938 he married Angela Schmikowski. The marriage produced two
children were born: Rita [1941- ] and
Hilmar [1944-2001]. In 1959, he married his second wife, with whom he lived
until his death.
In the 1960s as Alex Berg he co-wrote the screenplays for
three Euro-westerns: “The Last Ride to Santa Cruz” (1963), “Massacre at Marble
City” (1964) and “The Man With the Long Gun” (1968).
Through the producer Helmut Ringelmann he came in contact
with television and initially wrote television screenplays in the tradition of
Francis Durbridge. His greatest successes were his television crime series ‘The
Commissioner’ (1968-1975) with 97 episodes and ‘Derrick’ (1974-1998) with 281
episodes. The concept for the series Siska he developed and wrote the
screenplays for four episodes. In addition television films and TV specials
such as ‘Jakob and Adele’, ‘One Woman’ and ‘The Love Boat’.
Reinecker died on January 27, 2007 at the age of 92 at
his home in Kempfenhausen, Berg, Bavaria, Germany.
Today we remember Alex Berg (Herbert Reinecker) on what
would have been his 100th birthday.
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