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This chapter discusses the establishment of Hitler's dictatorship. The years leading up to 1933 were difficult ones for Germany. The Weimar Republic's parliament was divided into more than a dozen political parties, and from the onset of the Great Depression in 1929, German Chancellors had to rely increasingly on the President's emergency powers to pass legislation. At the end of 1932, when the crisis facing the country deepened and government ground to a standstill, a group of influential conservatives advised President Paul von Hindenburg that Adolf Hitler's leadership would be a way to deal with mounting social, economic, and political crisis. Hitler was appointed on 30 January 1933. Those men around the President and the social elites with whom they had contact, favoured Hitler as an interim leader, or at least saw him as a necessary evil. They no doubt believed that, lacking political experience, he would not be able to assert himself too much, and that they would retain ultimate control. They badly misjudged the situation. In less than six months the Nazis undermined the parliamentary system and had begun the destruction of justice by suspending civil and legal rights, which in turn opened the way for the creation of the Gestapo (Secret State Police) and the establishment of the first concentration camps.

This introductory chapter outlines the thrust of the book and provides the reader with a theoretical background. The author surveys the historiography of Hindenburg's career and his role in German politics. The most important scholarly texts on the politics of memory and commemoration and the history of political myths and hero worship are discussed. Turning to Weber's concept of charismatic authority, the author contends that its application to Hindenburg's case is limited because projection is defined as key. Hindenburg's followers could not simply mould him into the mythical figure they desired, but constantly had to incorporate the tumultuous events and his conflicting actions into the mythical narrative, making it an enduring, but ever-evolving phenomenon. Furthermore, it is argued that Hindenburg's adulation was no stride on a ‘special German path’, but had parallels elsewhere. However, the Hindenburg myth had grave consequences: it was inextricably linked to the rise of National Socialism.

This chapter investigates how the Hindenburg myth managed to survive Germany's worsening military and domestic situation in the second half of the war, eventually leading to military defeat and the collapse of the monarchies. Nevertheless, the Hindenburg myth still expressed the expectations of German society: to recreate order and recapture tranquility after the disruption of wartime, and to retrieve something positive from war. It is argued that the government of Max von Baden, as well as the democratic Left, relied on Hindenburg's mythical authority to ease the transition from monarchy to republic; the Hindenburg myth provided the symbolic backbone of the Ebert–Groener pact. Instead of turning against the Field Marshal, the Left vilified Ludendorff, and the Right found its scapegoat in the stab-in-the-back legend, blaming Socialists and Jews for German defeat. It is argued that while initially helping to expedite the transition to democracy, the Hindenburg myth soon turned into a burden for the young republic.

This chapter discusses the first presidential elections of the Weimar Republic, which saw Hindenburg beat his opponent Wilhelm Marx to succeed Friedrich Ebert as Germany's Reich President. It is argued that the Hindenburg myth played a crucial role in this fiercely modern and personalized election campaign. Nominated in the decisive second round of voting because his mythical reputation was considered an electoral asset, Hindenburg's campaign propaganda relied heavily on his image as a political ‘saviour’. The author maintains that the pro-republican parties failed to respond forcefully to being challenged openly by this national icon. It is argued that their own subscription to layers of the Hindenburg myth complicated their campaign efforts considerably. The author contends that Hindenburg owed his victory of April 1925 first and foremost to his mythical standing, which swayed right-wing Germans, but also held considerable allure amongst other groups, especially previous non-voters and Catholic Germans.

This chapter examines the fate of the Hindenburg myth during the period of relative stabilization of German politics and society. The author shows that Hindenburg's first term witnessed profound changes in attitude among his followers and former opponents. Although he had largely owed his presidential victory to the political right, radical right-wingers such as Heinrich Claβ and Joseph Goebbels started to turn their back on the President for his failure to overturn the republican order. Republicans, on the other hand, began to sing his praises for his constitutional stance and backing of crucial foreign policy initiatives. However, there was a considerable, if momentary, overlap of republican and anti-republican Hindenburg-worship, most evident during the near-regal festivities of his eightieth birthday in 1927. The chapter charts the mythical narrative as a multi-layered phenomenon appealing to different groups simultaneously, which helps to understand Hindenburg's remarkably broad and enduring appeal.

This chapter discusses the role of the Hindenburg myth during the early years of the ‘Third Reich’. Analyzing, amongst others, the celebrations of the ‘Day of Potsdam’ and the President's funeral in 1934, it is argued that the regime continued to accept Hindenburg as a parallel symbolic authority. His myth was crucial to consolidating Nazi rule after the ‘seizure of power’. It is shown that Hindenburg willingly participated in such propagandistic displays, and that the political will he left provided the regime with invaluable symbolic ammunition. A sense of trust in Hindenburg's personal integrity, and his power to alter people's fortunes, nevertheless survived among many of those pursued by the regime. That Hindenburg remained a rallying point for Nazi opponents highlights the perpetual polyvalence of his myth.

This chapter discusses the reinterpretation of Hindenburg in both German states after 1945. It shows that Hindenburg's role was soon reassessed by opinion makers: from ‘national saviour’ to the senile figure that ‘delivered’ Germany to Nazi rule. While this represented a break from his mythical glorification, it also entailed apologetic tendencies. In both FRG and GDR, blaming Hindenburg made it possible to skirt the issue of popular consent so vital to Nazi rule. The chapter illustrates that this reinterpretation of Hindenburg was mirrored in the symbolic realm: re-buried secretly in a church in Marburg, his unobtrusive post-war grave stands in sharp contrast to his monumental pre-war burial site. In the pluralist Federal Republic, undercurrents of Hindenburg's veneration have continued to exist: streets and army barracks still carry his name, and he remains a lieu de m é moire for select, but influential, groups, especially among German expellees.

This concluding chapter highlights common threads between chapters. It argues that Hindenburg's appeal was not limited by class, regional, or religious constraints. Hindenburg-worship differed qualitatively, and various versions of his myth evolved — but these often existed simultaneously. This polyvalence made the Hindenburg myth a more potent phenomenon than one trapped in the tight corset of the right-wing political sphere could ever have been. That his myth survived military failure and political disappointments is seen as cause to question the notion that it was simply moulded in the image of the expectations of German society. It is argued that Germans harboured strong wishes for a permanent national father figure and cherished the sense of order and continuity Hindenburg's mythical presence offered more than the various political — and military — goals associated with his name. Max Weber's model of ‘charismatic authority’ can therefore not be applied to Hindenburg's case in a clear-cut manner.

The main thesis of this chapter is that deception and dishonesty can create or aggravate conflicts and sometimes lead to disastrous consequences and, that, therefore, this sort of deception and dishonesty is morally wrong. The chapter provides a detailed account the myth of the “stab in the back” (Dolchstosslegende) and Germany's defeat in WWI. The widespread acceptance of this myth by the German people was one of the central causes of the rise of Nazism and the Holocaust. The chapter discusses other cases of deception and lying that distorted the historical record and led to very bad consequences; the examples given here are the dishonest version of history defended by neo‐Confederates in the aftermath of the US Civil War and lies denying the crimes of Joseph Stalin by the New York correspondent Walter Duranty. Then the chapter explicates the important concept of “half‐truths.” Half‐truths mislead people and distort the truth but fall short of lying (often, they fall short of deception). Even when it falls short of lying and deception, endorsing half‐truths is often a form of intellectual dishonesty. The chapter discusses several cases in which half‐truths have distorted the historical record and thereby aggravated social/political conflicts. The concept of half‐truths has widespread application in personal relationships. The chapter concludes by offering a brief account of the virtue of intellectual honesty (with particular attention to intellectual honesty about political questions).

How did the average German learn about politics? The decentral, fragmented nature of the German newspaper market meant that the great majority of contemporaries derived political information from a local paper. This chapter gives a broad sweep of controversial issues as portrayed in a sample of provinical newspapers around Berlin in the period 1925–8. It shows that even in self‐professed ‘unpolitical’ newspapers ideological news coverage was the norm. At the same time, this book demonstrates that overt press support for particular candidates or parties did not have a significant effect. Only where alternative sources of information, like a competing newspaper of a different political orientation, did not exist could the press excert a noticeable electoral impact. The chapter gives new evidence for the regionality of German politics, and helps to explain the tensions between countryside and metropolis.

Christine Beil examines German war exhibitions staged during the First World War to shape civilian perceptions of the conflict. These immensely popular exhibitions―which included mockups of trenches and dioramas presenting stereotypical images of enemy soldiers―used the power of the visual to prove Germany’s military and cultural superiority. Such a successful fusion of propaganda, entertainment, and education, the chapter argues, was later taken to new heights by the National Socialists..

Joseph Späh had to feed his dog; nothing strange about that. The problem was that Ulla, an Alsatian, was mostly confined to the freight room—off limits to passengers. Had everything gone according to schedule, this would not have been an issue either, except for gruff remarks from crewmen not appreciating the needs of this canine friend and co-worker in Späh’s stage act. But this flight did not go according to plan, and Späh’s frequent visits to the rear of the Hindenburg would give him problems in the years to come. The US Department of Energy, and its counterparts in Europe and Japan, are currently spending billions on developing the use of hydrogen for future energy applications—for example, as a fuel for cars and buses. The main advantage is the clean combustion of this fuel: two molecules of hydrogen gas will combine with one molecule of oxygen and give two molecules of water. The future belongs, perhaps, to the ‘hydrogen economy’, but unfortunately for its proponents, the popular history of hydrogen as a fuel is bound up with the tragedy of the Hindenburg. We will get back to Joseph Späh’s poor dog in a while, but for now ponder the fact that over the dog, and above everyone else aboard the comfortable and luxurious Hindenburg , there were huge ‘bags’ filled with hydrogen—the lightest of all the elements, with only one proton and one electron. It has the lowest density of any gas, and is formed by two hydrogen atoms combined together via a single chemical bond, made by sharing the two negatively charged electrons between the two positively charged nuclei. This H2 gas had carried the world’s largest airship from Frankfurt to Lakehurst outside New York, and before that on successful tours all over the globe during the preceding year. These days, we tend to wonder how people could even contemplate the idea of travelling around in what can be described as a flying bomb.

This chapter discusses Adolf Hitler's coming into power, and how very few Germans expected him to be an effective chancellor. Both Hugenberg and Papen, who took the crucial positions of economics minister and vice chancellor in Hitler's government, believed the would-be dictator was under their control. Hitler, outnumbered by non-Nazis eight to three in the Cabinet, appeared to be a weak “parliamentary” chancellor, backed by a Reichstag majority, but able to rule only at the mercy of the reluctant conservative allies who supplied him that majority. His power ultimately rested on the support of President Hindenburg, who had no intention of granting the new chancellor access to the almost limitless emergency presidential powers to which he held the key under the Weimar constitution.

This chapter examines the failure of elites to build consensus on a proper policy response to the onset of worldwide economic depression after the crash of the New York Stock Exchange in October 1929. Economic crisis overwhelmed all other public discussion in the early spring of 1930, when the Social Democratic chancellor Hermann Müller and his cabinet were forced to resign. In this potentially dire situation, Paul von Hindenburg decided to use his constitutional prerogative as president to declare a national emergency. In Hindenburg's eyes, not only had the Müller regime failed to formulate a response to the downturn, but more fundamentally, they had divided the national community, stoking class conflict and alienating the religious communities by advocating a complete separation of church and state. Thus, Hindenburg appointed Heinrich Brüning as chancellor, a policy expert from the country's Center Party, which represents the interests of Germany's Catholic population and was still strongly affiliated with the Catholic Church.