One of the first recruits to the National Socialist Workers party, or Nazi party

was Adolf Hitler.

Born in Austria in 1889, Hitler failed in his efforts to become a successful artist.

During the inflationary crisis of 1923, Hitler made an attempt to seize power. Hitler jumped on a table in a Munich beer hall and announced, “The revolution has

begun!”

Hitler was arrested and jailed. While in prison, Hitler

wrote the autobiography, Mein Kampf (My Struggle).

In Hitler’s mind:

1. Germans were not responsible for losing WWI.

2. Jews and Communists were to be

blamed for the defeat.

3. Declared the Germans were a “master race” whose destiny would

rule the world.

Hitler saw himself as the leader who would unite all German- speaking people into a new empire that would dominate other

groups.

Http://xx.acs.appstate.edu/top/orgs/srp/rise.html

Hitler used his powers to crush his opponents and consolidate

his rule.

During his rule Hitler did 3 things:

1. He banned all political parties except the Nazi party.

2. He discarded constitutional guarantees of freedom of speech,

assembly, religion, and press.

3. He placed labor unions under Nazi control.

4. The Nazi government regulated wages, working hours, housing, and

the production of goods.

Hitler’s secret police, the Gestapo, arrested Jews and other opponents of

the government by the thousands.

Others were sent to concentration camps, large prison camps where political prisons or refugees were

confined.

http://www.spectacle.org/695/pictures/deport.gif

http://www.remember.org/educate/aimg0016.html

More than one million Poles were deported to forced labor camps in NaziGermany. There are no books, nor data showing the number of people who weremurdered in those camps.

http://www.earthstation1.com/HolocaustFiles/Sounds/Murrow_on_Buchenwald.ram

The accounts of the tragedy of the Holocaust are disturbing.

Assured of absolute power, Hitler took the title of der Furer, “the

Leader” and called his government the Third Reich.

Hitler ignored the provisions of the Versailles Treaty, which limited the size of

the German army, and ordered German factories to begin turning out guns,

ammunition, airplanes, tanks, and other weapons.

Hitler made no secret of his ambitions to expand Germany’s territory: “Today

Germany; tomorrow, the world!”