{{Short description|Chilean politician (1899–1976)}} {{Use dmy dates|date=March 2021}} {{family name hatnote|Schnake|Vergara|lang=Chilean}} {{more citations needed|date=March 2021}} {{Infobox officeholder | name = Óscar Schnake | image = 250px | birth_date = {{birth date|1899|5|11|df=y}} | birth_place = Galvarino, Chile | death_date = {{death date and given age|df=y|1976|4|24|76}} | death_place = Santiago, Chile | office = Minister of Public Works | president = Juan Antonio Ríos | term_start = 18 August 1942 | term_end = 21 October 1942 | predecessor = ''Office created'' | successor = Enrique Amagada | office1 = Minister of Development | president1 = Juan Antonio Ríos | term_start1 = 2 February 1942 | term_end1 = 18 August 1942 | predecessor1 = ''Office finished'' | successor1 = Rolando Merino Reyes | president2 = Pedro Aguirre Cerda | term_start2 = 28 September 1939 | term_end2 = 16 December 1941 | predecessor2 = Arturo Bianchi | successor2 = Rolando Merino Reyes | office3 = Member of the Senate | constituency3 = 1st Provincial Grouping | term_start3 = 15 May 1937 | term_end3 = 28 September 1939 | office4 = Secretary General of the Socialist Party of Chile | term_start4 = 1933 | term_end4 = 1939 | party = Socialist Party<br/>(1933–1976) | alma_mater = Universidad de Chile | occupation = Politician | profession = Physician | spouse = Gabriela Contreras Barrenechea{{Sfn|Elsey|2011|p=115}} | footnotes = }} '''Oscar Alex Enrique Schnake Vergara''' (11 June 1899 – 24 April 1976) was a Chilean politician and physician, who served as a Senator and minister.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.bcn.cl/historiapolitica/resenas_parlamentarias/wiki/Oscar_Alex_Enrique_Schnake_Vergara |title=Oscar Schnake Vergara – BCN |website=Library of the National Congress of Chile |language=es |access-date=29 December 2025}}</ref> He was a founder member of the Chilean Socialist Party<ref name="Nodo XXI">{{cite web|title=Nodo XXI inicia su escuela de formación recordando a Eugenio González Rojas|url=https://www.eldesconcierto.cl/nacional/2014/03/19/nodo-xxi-inicia-su-escuela-de-formacion-recordando-eugenio-gonzalez-rojas.html|accessdate=21 March 2020|publisher=El Desconcierto|date=19 March 2014|first=Rodrigo|last=Ruíz}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|title=Salvador Allende, toda una vida por Chile|url=http://www.escambray.cu/2013/salvador-allende-toda-una-vida-por-chile/|accessdate=21 March 2020|publisher=Escambray|date=9 September 2013}}</ref> and close to President Pedro Aguirre Cerda (1938–1941).
He has been described as one of the notorious leaders of the Chilean social democracy.<ref>{{cite web|last=Rojas|first=Mauricio|title=Mauricio Rojas: El pacto de la vergüenza|url=https://ellibero.cl/opinion/mauricio-rojas-el-pacto-de-la-verguenza/|accessdate=21 March 2020|publisher=El Líbero|date=16 July 2019}}</ref>
His wife, Gabriela Contreras de Schnake, was mayor of Santiago Centro in the early 1940s.{{Sfn|Elsey|2011|p=115}}
==Biography== Schnake was the grandson of a German immigrant from Kassel. In 1933, alongside Eugenio González Rojas, with whom showed his anarchist affiliation, he founded the collective Acción Revolucionaria Socialista (ARS). Then, this association and another three merged into the current Socialist Party of Chile in April 1933, so that he was a founder member next to Marmaduke Grove, Eugenio Matte, Salvador Allende and González Rojas.<ref>{{cite web|title=El Verdugo del siglo XIX Chileno: Eugenio González Rojas|url=https://www.eldesconcierto.cl/nacional/2013/12/30/el-verdugo-del-xix-chileno-eugenio-gonzalez-rojas.html|accessdate=21 March 2020|publisher=El Desconcierto|date=30 December 2013|first=Rodrigo|last=Ruíz}}</ref>
He was the organizer of the Left Block, a political coalition which reunited left-wing political forces other with the exception of the Communist Party (PC) or the centrist Radical Party (PR). Nevertheless, the rising of both President Arturo Alessandri Palma's liberal-conservative right and Chilean Nazis (MNSCh, «nacis») forced him to seal an alliance with the PC and the PR. That way, it was established Popular Front of Chile, whose leader was Pedro Aguirre Cerda, who triumphed the 1938 Chilean presidential election over liberal-manchesterian economist Gustavo Ross Santa María.
In 1948, he was part of the Chilean Anti-Communist Action board.<ref>{{cite web|title=Erich Schnake Silva, un apasionado socialista chileno|url=http://www.memoriachilena.gob.cl/602/w3-printer-94595.html|accessdate=22 March 2021|publisher=Memoria Chilena}}</ref>
After 1973 coup d'état led by Augusto Pinochet, his nephew Eric suffered persecution under Chilean dictatorship.<ref>{{cite web|title=Erich Schnake Silva, un apasionado socialista chileno|url=https://elpais.com/diario/2005/11/25/agenda/1132873207_850215.html|accessdate=22 March 2020|publisher=El País|date=24 November 2005|first=Manuel|last=Délano|work=El País }}</ref>
He died in 1976 away from the political life as did his friend González Rojas. A year later, Raúl Ampuero made a tribute entitled «Óscar Schnake and Eugenio González: Not only history».
==Pictures== {| class="wikitable" style="text-align:center" |- !colspan=1|Discourse !Popular Front March |- |frameless|250x250px |frameless|250x250px |- |Schnake during a political concentration<br/>1930s |Rolando Merino Reyes, Schnake and Salvador Allende<br/>9 June 1940. |}
==References== {{Reflist|2}}
==Further reading== *{{cite book |author-link=Brenda Elsey |last=Elsey |first=Brenda |title="Citizen & Sportsmen". Fútbol & Politics in 20th-Century Chile |publisher=University of Texas Press |year=2011}} * Ponce Duran, Pedro. Oscar Schnake Vergara. Comienzos Del Socialismo Chileno, 1933–1942. Ediciones Documentas. Santiago. {{isbn|978-9562610179}} 1994 * Moraga Valle, Fabio. "Muchachos casi silvestres". La Federación de Estudiantes y el movimiento estudiantil chileno, 1906–1936, Santiago, Universidad de Chile, 2007.
==External links== * [https://www.bcn.cl/historiapolitica/resenas_parlamentarias/wiki/Oscar_Alex_Enrique_Schnake_Vergara Profile] at Biblioteca Nacional del Congreso
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Schnake, Óscar}} Category:1899 births Category:1976 deaths Category:University of Chile alumni Category:Socialist Party of Chile politicians Category:Chilean anti-communists Category:Senators of the XXXVIII Legislative Period of the National Congress of Chile Category:Pedro Aguirre Cerda cabinet ministers Category:Juan Antonio Ríos cabinet ministers Category:Members of the 1925 Chilean Consultative Comission