Famous people from the region

From Peter Rosegger to Toni Schruf and Johannes Brahms

The region of Semmering-Waldheimat-Veitsch has been shaped by many famous personalities. The following text presents a selection of people whose history is inevitably linked to the region and its development or evolution. Among them is the local poet Peter Rosegger, who did so much more than just coin the term ‘Waldheimat’. His literary works are still relevant today. Gain your own insight into his life by visiting his birthplace, the Waldschule am Alpl or his country house in Krieglach.

Another important figure is one of Rosegger’s companions and contemporaries, Toni Schruf, whose far-sightedness and intuition (especially with regard to tourism) promoted the further development of the entire region. You might call him a founder of winter sports in the easternmost region of what is today Upper Styria. His friend Max Kleinoschegg is certainly another initiator of the movement, and both men are regarded as skiing pioneers. Learn about their stories, and more, at the FIS Winter!Sport!Museum! Mürzzuschlag.

This movement gave rise to early tourism in the region and – with the Semmering Railway as a driving force – attracted many summer visitors, including Johannes Brahms. Brahms lived in a flat in Mürzzuschlag, which is now part of the Brahms Museum. He composed here and explored the surroundings.

Back then, this ‘real’ travel was only made possible by the construction of the Semmering Railway (beginning in 1848). Austrian engineer Carl Ritter von Ghega is world-famous as the builder of what is now a UNESCO World Heritage Site: the Semmering Railway. Experience the history of the development of the railway ‘over the mountains’ from Vienna to Trieste at the SÜDBAHN Museum Mürzzuschlag.