National Socialist Teachers' Association

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The National Socialist Teachers' Association (NSLB) was an association affiliated to the party structure of the NSDAP. From 1933 it developed into the sole teachers' organization in the Nazi state and existed until 1943.

Organization and direction

The NSLB was founded in 1927 by the suspended Upper Franconian teacher and Bavarian member of the state parliament, Hans Schemm (1891-1935), as a loose association of National Socialist teachers. The often mentioned founding date of April 21, 1929 is based on a subsequent correction by which Schemm's successor Fritz Wächtler was stylized as a founding member. At the end of 1929 the NSLB had a good 200 members, the number of which rose to 11,000 by January 1933.

After the establishment of the Nazi regime through the Enabling Act of March 24, 1933 and the so-called Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service of April 7, 1933, Schemm set about transforming the NSLB into a unified organization for all educators - regardless of education and training and area of ​​activity. to expand. This happened on the one hand through the advertising of individual members who no longer had to belong to the NSDAP after the admission ban of May 1933, and on the other hand through the corporate accession of the existing teachers' associations to a "German educator community" dominated by the NSLB. Only the General Free Teachers 'Union of Germany and the General German Teachers' Association anticipated this by dissolving themselves. The "German Educational Community" was solemnly proclaimed in Magdeburg on June 8, 1933 and was soon referred to as the "Potsdam of the Teaching Body". Against their DC circuit , however, the reluctant Philologenverband , the Bavarian teachers association and some other organizations and formed in December 1933 under the patronage of Minister of the Interior Wilhelm Frick a competing educator community. But Schemm prevailed in the party power struggle. So the NSLB eventually became a mass organization with around 300,000 members (1938), 70 percent of whom were elementary school teachers. A third of the teaching staff was, in addition to NSLB membership, also a member of the NSDAP.

Of course, old organizational structures continued to exist under the umbrella of the NSLB, namely in the form of seven student councils, in which some functionaries of the old teachers' associations were initially able to continue their work. Twelve subject areas such as school camps, teacher training and racial issues were set up in 1934 across this structure. The main task of the NSLB in an agreement with the Reich Minister of Education in 1936 was the political and global education of educators in the National Socialist sense. This was the purpose of the so-called “camp training” concept: In a total of 29 Gau schools and 57 permanent training camps of the NSLB (1936), subject-specific “teacher camps” were held for all teachers, each lasting several weeks, for ideological training of the participants. Organized mountain tours for teachers were also part of the offer in so-called Reich exchange camps.

The organization was based in the House of German Education in Bayreuth , which was completed in 1936 . The central journalistic organ of the NSLB appeared from 1929 to 1945 under three different titles: From August 1929 to June 1933 as the National Socialist teachers' newspaper. Combat sheet of the National Socialist Teachers' Association (NSLZ); from July 1933 to March 1938 as the Reich newspaper of the German educators. National Socialist Teachers' Magazine (RZDE) and from April 1938 to January / February 1945 as Der Deutsche Erzieher. Reichszeitung of the National Socialist Teachers' Association (DDE). The NSLB gave the newspaper Hilf mit! out, which packed racist and anti-Jewish propaganda in folk- harmonistic framework narratives and reached almost the entire student body from the age of 10 with a circulation of five million copies per issue every month.

The influence of the NSLB within the Nazi system of rule remained limited, however, as the Hitler Youth appeared to the party leadership to be better suited to producing ideological National Socialists. A member of the exiled SPD came to the conclusion in 1938: "In the struggle between the Reich Youth Leadership and NSLB, the former is the stronger, the more aggressive and the unrestrained organization geared towards the power of National Socialism." After the start of the war, the NSLB lost in the power structure of the third Rich continues to be important. His attempt to represent teachers' interests earned him the accusation of “union” behavior on the part of the party leadership. In February 1943 it was officially "shut down" as part of the war-related simplification measures and thus effectively dissolved.

In the publication by Müller / Ortmeyer, the NSLB is referred to in the very first sentence as a “criminal organization”, “which was banned by the Allies with good reason after May 8, 1945.” This formulation gives the impression that the characterization works returned to the Allies as a criminal organization . But this is not the case. Although the NSLB was one of the 64 Nazi organizations that were banned by the Control Council Act No. 2 of October 10, 1945, it was not one of the four groups of people who were judged to be `` criminal '' in the Nuremberg trial of the main war criminals (leader corps of the NSADP , Gestapo, SD and SS). The authors' assessment therefore lacks any justification. Equally questionable is the repeated claim that the old teachers' associations joined the NSLB entirely voluntarily. Intimidation and terror of the Nazi regime are simply ignored here. When the chairman of the German Association of Philologists , Felix Wilhelm Behrend , announced his resignation at the end of March 1933, it was a reaction to the fact that he had previously been attacked and severely abused by SA men.

staff

The NSLB had the following organizational structure:

Reichsamtsleiter: Hans Schemm (1929–1935) and Fritz Wächtler (1935–1943)
Head of Staff / Managing Director (until August 1936): Max Kolb
Main department of education and instruction: Georg Roder until spring 1935, Hans Stricker (born 1897)
Training: Carl Wolf
Literature: Paul Georg Herrmann , from 1942 Walter Arnold
Organization / Managing Director (1936–42): Heinrich Friedmann (fallen 1942)
Press and propaganda: Heinrich Hansen, from 1939 Walter Arnold
Economy and law: Andreas Tränkenschuh
Treasurer: Hugo Jünger

For individual subjects, interdisciplinary areas or the five types of schools, Reich clerks and Reichsfachschaftsleiter (also known as Reichswalter) were appointed, mostly on a part-time basis, often former functionaries of the disbanded professional associations to which Gau clerks and district clerks were assigned at the Gau level , e.g. B .:

Ancient languages: Friedrich Einhorn (1888–1978), Herbert Holtorf (Deputy, 1891–1959)
German: Alfred Huhnhäuser
Newer foreign languages: Heinrich Fischer
Race questions: Karl Zimmermann
Philosophy, psychology, pedagogy: Johann Baptist Rieffert
History: Moritz Edelmann
Geography: Albrecht Burchard , from 1940 Friedrich Knieriem
Geopolitics: Johann Ulrich Folkers
Citizenship: Walther Wallowitz (1904–1943)
Art education: Robert Böttcher
Music education: Karl Landgrebe
Physical education: Hans Berendes (until 1939), Albert Hirn (deputy), Otto Stadermann (from 1942)
Speech training : Fritz Gerathewohl
Biology: Ernst Lehmann
Mathematics and natural sciences: Kuno Fladt
Physics: Karl Hahn (from 1936)
Female upbringing: Auguste Reber-Grube
Housekeeping: Grete Buck
Higher schools: Rudolf Benze , from 1936 Karl Frank
Middle schools: Nikolaus Maaßen
Elementary schools: Ernst Bargheer
Special schools : Paul Ruckau , from 1938 Fritz Zwanziger
Vocational and technical schools: Walter Pipke (born 1899)
Socio-educational professions: Hans Volkelt 1934–1938
School camps: Rudolf Nicolai until October 1935
School radio: Georg Brendel

The powerful "Reichsreferentin for female education" in the association was Auguste Reber-Gruber , one of four leading female Nazi officials.

In July 1935, the university teaching staff , which was initially organized with, was spun off and linked to the National Socialist German Dozen Association (NSDDB).

literature

  • Rainer Bölling : Social history of the German teachers. An overview from 1800 to the present, Göttingen 1983.
  • Willi Feiten: The National Socialist Teachers Association. Development and organization. A contribution to the structure and organizational structure of the National Socialist system of rule (studies and documentation on the history of German education 19), Beltz, Weinheim 1981.
  • Henning Heske : Kuno Fladt and the Reich subject area mathematics and natural sciences in the National Socialist teachers' association . In: Contributions to mathematics lessons 2019, pp. 361–364.
  • Monika Meister: “German educator! You have to shape the future mothers of the people! ”The pedagogue Auguste Reber-Gruber (1892–1946). In: Hiltrud Häntzschel , Hadumod Bußmann (ed.): Threateningly clever. A century of women and science in Bavaria. Beck, Munich 1997, ISBN 3-406-41857-0 , pp. 248-255.
  • Saskia Müller / Benjamin Ortmeyer : The ideological orientation of teachers 1933–1945. Mastery, racism and hostility to Jews in the National Socialist Teachers' Association. A documentary analysis by the central organ of the NSLB. Beltz Juventa, Weinheim 2016, ISBN 978-3-7799-3414-1 .
  • (PDF) Uwe Schmidt: Teachers in lockstep. The National Socialist Teachers' Union Hamburg , Hamburg 2006.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. See Paul Georg Herrmann, The foundation of the NS teacher association, in: Reichszeitung der deutschen Erzieher, 4th year 1936, issue 1, p. 22 f.
  2. ^ Andreas Kraas: Teachers' camp 1932–1945. Political function and educational design , Bad Heilbrunn 2004, p. 89ff. and p. 349ff. ISBN 3781513475
  3. ^ Saskia Müller / Benjamin Ortmeyer: The ideological orientation of teachers 1933-1945. Mastery, racism and hostility to Jews in the National Socialist Teachers' Association. A documentary analysis by the central organ of the NSLB. Beltz Juventa, Weinheim 2016, p. 28f.
  4. ^ Benjamin Ortmeyer: Indoctrination. Racism and anti-Semitism in the Nazi school magazine "Help with!" (1933-1944). Analysis and documents . Beltz Juventa, Weinheim 2013, p. 7 u. P. 39.
  5. Germany reports of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (Sopade) 1934–1940, Frankfurt a. M. 1980, year 1939, p. 308.
  6. Müller / Ortmeyer, p. 11.
  7. Most of the information from the Nazi teacher newspaper, 1936, issue 7, on the inauguration of the House of German Education
  8. ^ Benjamin Ortmeyer: Nazi ideology in the NSLB magazine "Die Deutsche Volksschule" 1934-1944 A documentary analysis. 2018, accessed August 4, 2019 .
  9. ^ Andreas Kraas: Teachers' camp 1932-1945: Political function and educational design . Klinkhardt, Bad Heilbrunn 2004, ISBN 3-7815-1347-5 .
  10. Herrmann (1899–1959) was an Upper Palatinate clan researcher who headed the office established for this purpose in the NSLB. He wanted to record and evaluate the family trees of all German educators. In addition, the censorship of all school literature (youth literature, educational magazines, libraries, school teaching aids) was assigned to him. In 1941 he was drafted as a captain.
  11. ^ Heinrich Hoffmann (photographer) , Heinrich Hansen (ed.): Das Raumbild. Stereoscopic magazine for time and space . 1938.
  12. Erich Burck et al. a .: Special issue on the history of the DAV. DAV, 1987, accessed July 22, 2019 .
  13. Reiner Lehberger: Learning English under National Socialism . Stauffenberg, 1986, ISBN 978-3-923721-11-5 .
  14. Henning Heske : And tomorrow the whole world: geography lessons under National Socialism . Norderstedt 2008, ISBN 978-3-8370-1021-3 .
  15. R. Böttcher: The "Art Education". Association of German Art Teachers, 1938, accessed on July 22, 2019 .
  16. Hans-Peter de Lorent: perpetrator profiles. Those responsible in Hamburg's education system under the swastika. tape 3 . Hamburg 2019.
  17. My Life in the Service of School, especially Middle School , 1959
  18. ^ Matthias Busch: Citizenship in the Weimar Republic: Genesis of a democratic subject didactics . Klinkhardt, 2016, ISBN 978-3-7815-2069-1 , p. 112 f .
  19. Andreas Pehnke: Biography of Rudolf Nicolai. In: Saxon Biography. Institute for Saxon History and Folklore, accessed on July 22, 2019 .