Schindler’s List factory becomes museum

During World War Two, German industrialist Oskar Schindler saved some 1,200 of his Jewish workers from extermination. His enamelware and munitions factories were considered vital for the German war effort and he claimed his workers all had special skills vital for the operation of his factories, whether they had or not. Many of his “skilled mechanics” were in fact children or handicapped people.

Schindler became the subject of the book Schindler’s Ark and later the movie Schindler’s List. Now part of his factory in Krakow has become a museum to the city’s war years.

The exhibitions cover the outbreak of the war, the German invasion of Poland, Polish resistance movements, and Schindler’s struggle to save his workers. The museum is a branch of the Krakow City Historical Museum. The front page of their website has a short video about Schindler that’s quite powerful, even if you don’t understand Polish.

Photo courtesy Noa Cafri via Wikimedia Commons.

The bureaucracy of genocide

The typical image of a Nazi is a jackbooted thug gunning down innocent people. While there were all too many killers like that in the Third Reich, the majority of Nazis were civilians. It takes a lot of people to run a government and an army, and many Nazis never personally killed anyone. They were educated, middle-class bureaucrats who loved their children, were kind to their neighbors, and spent their workday running one of the most brutal regimes the world has ever seen.

A new museum in Berlin examines the role of these mild-mannered perpetrators of genocide. The Topography of Terror Documentation Center opens today, the day before the 65th anniversary of the Third Reich’s surrender to Allied forces. The museum is built over the site of the former SS and Gestapo headquarters.

Exhibits explain how the bureaucracy worked, planning oppression and genocide with the same meticulous care and red tape that other governments plan road expansion schemes and educational policy. One of the most arresting exhibits is a wall covered with 7,000 index cards containing employee information. Sixteen of these stick out a bit, marking those employees who were brought to trial after the war. Of these, only three were convicted. The museum goes on to explain what happened to the rest of the 7,000. The vast majority of them simply faded back into civilian life, some even becoming prominent in the regimes of West and East Germany.

Some of the building’s victims became prominent too. Erich Honecker, the last leader of East Germany, spent time in a cell here for his Communist activities. Another inmate was Kurt Schumacher, who led a socialist militia in street fights against the Nazis and later spent ten years in concentration camps. After the war he led the Social Democratic Party, still one of the major parties in Germany today.

As the horrors of the Second World War fade from living memory into history, European countries are struggling to reassess their past. Controversial moves such as converting a Nazi hotel into a youth hostel and painting Stalin’s picture on a bus often overshadow thoughtful exhibits such as this one.

“Degenerate Art” scattered by Nazis back in German museum

Back in the 1920s and 30s, the Museum Folkwang in Essen, Germany, had one of the best collections of contemporary art in the world. The Nazis didn’t like modernism, though, partially because they didn’t understand it, and partially because so many Jews, liberals, and homosexuals were prominent in the art scene. It didn’t help that modern art questioned values such as nationalism and militarism. So out went the art, scattered around the globe and into collections that put taste before politics.

Now it’s coming back. The Folkwang just finished a major redesign and to celebrate they’re collecting many of the old works that the Nazis had branded as “Degenerate Art.” The exhibition The Most Beautiful Museum in the World runs from March 20 to July 25 and includes 1,400 works taken from the museum in 1936. Works by such prominent artists as Chagall, Gauguin, and Kandinsky will hang next to lesser-known works that attracted the ire of the Nazis.

Yet the Nazi connection doesn’t stop there. The 55 million euro ($77 million) redesign was supplied by Berthold Beitz, a 96 year-old German industrialist. Back during WWII he ran several oil refineries in occupied Poland to supply the German army, but he also saved the lives of 800 Jews by convincing authorities he needed them to work in his refineries and offices. Yad Vashem includes him in the Righteous among the Nations.

Besides the museum, Essen offers lots of green space, a historic city center, an elegant cathedral, a tour of a massive coal mine, and a wide variety of cultural events.

“Arbeit macht frei” Auschwitz sign stolen

Poland’s grimmest monument has lost its most famous icon.

The sign at the entrance to the Auschwitz concentration camp, “Arbeit macht frei” (“Work will set you free”) was stolen in the early hours of this morning.

The Polish government and Jewish groups have condemned the theft. There are no known suspects at this time and the motive is also unknown. Some Jewish groups have blamed unnamed neo-Nazi groups but none have claimed responsibility. And while there is a large and lucrative black market for stolen historical objects, such a recognizable piece would be very difficult to sell, although thefts of famous artifacts have been commissioned before.

The sign stood at the entrance to Auschwitz, one of the most notorious concentration camps set up during the Nazi regime. Located in occupied Poland, its executions, forced labor, and gas chambers sent about one million people to their deaths. Most of the victims were Jews, but Gypsies, political prisoners, and others were also killed.

The main question at the moment is how the thieves managed to cut down a sixteen-foot long iron sign and haul it away without any of the patrols of security cameras noticing them.

Thailand Hitler billboard draws controversy

A Hitler billboard in Thailand promoting a local wax museum has locals and foreign governments up in arms. The billboard campaign, which features photos of famous dead people, included a photo of Hitler making the infamous Nazi salute along with the tagline “Hitler is not dead.” The ad was part of a promotion for Louis Tussaud’s Waxworks, a wax museum based in Pattaya.

Since the billboard’s unveiling two weeks ago it has caused a firestorm of complaints, prompting museum officials to have it covered and to apologize for the offense. Both the German and Israeli embassies in Thailand filed formal complaints. Wax museum director Somporn Naksuetrong has emphasized the campaign was not meant to glorify the Nazi leader.

Not surprisingly, this isn’t the first Adolf Hitler wax museum incident to draw controversy. In 2008 a German man rushed into the new Madame Tussaud’s in Berlin, ripping the head off the museum’s Hitler figurine and shouting “Never war again!”

The use of Hitler’s likeness, whether as a wax dummy or in advertising, never fails to attract criticism. But that hasn’t stopped museums and brands from capitalizing on Hitler to draw attention, a decision that almost always ends poorly. Anyone hoping to draw tourist dollars from Nazi imagery in the future would do well to keep this in mind.

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