Look back in time
Blick into die Zeit was a social - democratic weekly magazine critical of the regime that could appear in Berlin from June 16, 1933 to the end of August 1935 .
history
The weekly magazine Blick in die Zeit was published by the magazine publisher Dr. A. Ristow, based in Berlin-Halensee . Alfred Ristow, a former intelligence officer in the German Army , was the owner of a telecommunications technology company, and he had Kurt Hermann Mendel (1900–1983) print the bulletin of an officers' association. The advertising specialist Mendel had a stake in the Berolina printing company and it was from him that the initiative to found the magazine Blick in die Zeit came from. Externally, Ristow acted as editor and publisher; internally, Mendel took a 50 percent stake as a silent partner in the Dr. A. Ristow.
Mendel had developed the journalistic concept, which the subtitle Press Reviews from Germany and Abroad made clear for business, politics and culture : There were no articles of their own, but text excerpts already published in other press products. The criticism of the regime arose from the selection and compilation of the text excerpts. Full-time jobs for the magazine were:
- Management: Kurt Exner , before 1933 union secretary at the ADGB in Berlin
- Editing: Andreas Gayk , before 1933 editor at the Schleswig-Holsteinische Volkszeitung in Kiel
- Sales: Hans Weinberger , before 1933 managing director of the Reichsarbeitsgemeinschaft der Kinderfreunde .
There was no written agreement between Ristow and Mendel for the establishment and operation of the publisher, only an oral agreement, according to which they shared the stake and management in a 50:50 ratio. Ristow was solely responsible for the publication of the magazine, the content, the editing and the publisher. Mendel was responsible for the financing of the project including liability for possible losses. This construction served the personal protection of the actors involved from possible persecution by the Gestapo .
The circulation was 100,000 copies at a unit price of RM 0.15 . The number of readers should have been around 400,000 to 500,000. This relatively high prevalence resulted from the personal distribution within the trade union and social democratic organizations, which were banned by the rulers. The maintenance of an underground network created a basis on which the re-establishment of the SPD and the trade unions, but also the establishment of the constitutional organs, could take place after the Second World War . People who worked in the editorial office took on political, economic or cultural positions after 1945:
- Michael Freund : Professor at the University of Kiel
- Rudolf Küstermeier : Editor-in-chief of the newspaper Die Welt until 1950 and since 1957 Israel correspondent for the German Press Agency
- Friedrich Mandelkow: Head of the Kiel city administration until 1952
- Ludwig Preller : Minister of Economics in the 1st cabinet Hermann Lüdemann in Schleswig-Holstein
- August Rathmann: Activities in the Steel Trustees Association and in the Society for Social Business Practice, Düsseldorf
- Otto Suhr : Governing Mayor of Berlin (1955–1957).
The journalist Karl Rickers was able to determine in a retrospective that the weekly magazine had remained without major influence from the censorship authorities . It wasn't until an article on The Future of War that the magazine was banned in August 1935.
garnish
Karl Rickers gained his comprehensive overall insight into the working methods of the publisher, the editorial team and the sales department because he published the supplement Kurz Pause! edited. The entertainment paper, which could not be sold individually, appeared every Saturday to look back in time . Contributors to the graphic design:
- Graphic artist Niels Brodersen ,
- Painter Gottfried Brockmann ,
- satirical draftsman Karl Holtz
- Graphic artist Richard Grune
Text contributions were made by Hans Adam, who later became the director of the Kiel engineering school. The side dish Short break! , also KP! called, was also banned in August 1935.
documentation
After 1945, there has been only a small amount of documentation for the Blick in die Zeit campaign . The first depictions were made in 1974 by the authors Michael Freund, August Rathmann and Ludwig Preller in the memory book about Andreas Gayk. As contributing editors, they reported on their own activities as well as on the entire concept. In 1980 a report by Henning Harmsen followed in the Badische Zeitung under the title Resistance with scissors and glue . In the volume accompanying the exhibition Resistance 1933 to 1945 - Social Democrats and Trade Unions Against Hitler , published by the Friedrich Ebert Foundation in 1980, the weekly magazine Blick in die Zeit states :
- "One of the strangest manifestations of German resistance" .
literature
- Michael Freund: The journalist . In: Jürgen Jensen and Karl Rickers (eds.): Andreas Gayk and his time. 1893-1954. Memories of the Lord Mayor of Kiel . Wachholtz, Neumünster 1974, pp. 51-64.
- Ludwig Preller: A revealing press review. Examples from "Blick in die Zeit" from 1934. Ibid., Pp. 69–74.
- August Rathmann: Against National Socialism. The Berlin weekly magazine "Blick in die Zeit" 1933 to 1935. Ibid., Pp. 65–68.
source
- Kurt Hermann Mendel: The action look into the time . Online version (PDF; 3.4 MB)