In 1985 the former chancellor Helmut Schmidt founded a Freitagsgesellschaft, a Friday Society, in Hamburg. Its 25 members met during the winter semesters, on the second Friday of each month, at Schmidt’s house in Hamburg-Langenhorn. Each evening had a lecture followed by a discussion. Party membership did not matter. Until her death, his wife Loki Schmidt took care of the guests’ dinner herself. Over 175 lectures were held. The society was dissolved at the end of the winter semester 2014–15. Schmidt gave up the role of host for reasons of age, and no successor could be found.