Otto Adolf Hans Frank was born on April 25, 1895 in Vienna as the son of a diplomat. After finishing school, he studied law at the University of Vienna and passed his state examination in 1917. In 1922 he married the Austrian film actress Ilse Weber. In 1924, Frank was appointed Assistant Professor of the Law Faculty at the University of Vienna and three years later he was made Director of the University's Press and Information Office
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He also worked as a freelance film reviewer and editor. In 1930, Frank moved to Berlin where he was appointed editor of the Berliner Illustrierte Zeitung and became a close friend of Joseph Goebbels. In 1934, he published his first work, Grundlagen der Selbsterziehung (Foundations of Self-Education), which became a bestseller.
The same year he separated from his wife and married his mistress Martha Schulmann. His second book, Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung (The World as Will and Idea) (1936) became another bestseller and established him as a leading exponent of political propaganda. After Hitler came to power in 1933, Frank quickly rose through the ranks of the Nazi hierarchy and was appointed Gauleiter (Reich governor) for Silesia in March 1934.
Later that year he was appointed Reichsstatthalter (Governor General) for Bohemia and Moravia by Hitler himself. In this capacity, Frank implemented right-wing policies such as anti-semitism, nazification and suppression of liberal democracy throughout the country's provinces - with some success: New laws restricting political activity by Jews were introduced and over 3,000 synagogues were destroyed or converted into churches. From 1939 to 1945 Frank served as Governor General of Poland under Himmler's directorship while simultaneously administering some occupied areas in Germany itself.
While some historians claim that Frank's actions in Poland were motivated by anti-semitism or even fascism, others consider them no more than an attempt to rationalise an irrational policy after Germany had already conquered Poland - an attempt which very few Poles supported anyway. During the war, Frank remained an ardent supporter of Hitler and helped him plan his policy of genocide against Jews and Slavs in occupied territories; furthermore, he played an active role in planning German occupation policy in France and Belgium (where he adopted a more humane stance). When France capitulated to Germany on June 22nd 1940, despite Hitler's original intention not to do so
