75 years ago World War II ended in Europa. Back in 2018, when the World celebrated the Centenary of the End of World War I, I actually was thinking about a three-year-series of posts here on the blog: World War I in 2018, the Interwar Period in 2019 and World War II in 2020, but as I already wrote here I failed to write much in 2019 and even now I did not managed to write anything in time for this important jubilee. As I currently have an interest in the Weimar Republic, which was actually supposed to be part of the last year, I write this post about this period in German history now and later on I will write some little posts about World War II, but these have to wait. So for the moment have fun with my ten personal favourite facts about the Weimar Republic.
1 The Weimar Constitution was actually quite interesting.
Studying constitutions and other legal textes might not be the most interesting part of history and unfortunately I still did not managed to read the Weimar Constitution as a whole, but its creation and influence are a worthy first fact. First of all it has to be mentioned that is was actually called Weimar Constitution, because it was signed in the small Thuringian town of Weimar. Berlin was unsuitable, because riots would prevent the free work of the delegates. Weimar on the other side was a linking point with the history of Goethe, Schiller and other great figures of the German literature and was also easy to defend in the case of a attack. As news and mail from Berlin were still needed in Weimar, the first regular air mail service in Germany was established between the two cities. When the Weimar National Assembly was elected earlier in January 1919, most of the German women were able to vote for the first time (some were earlier able to vote on state level). After 1933 the constitution was never formally repealed and stayed in force until the 1945. The 1949 Constitution of the German Democratic Republic, the Basic Law for the Federal Republic of Germany and the first official constitution of the Republic of Korea were later all based on the Weimar Constitution.
2 The first commemorative stamps of the German Empire were issued during the Weimar era.
As it is written in the first article of the Weimar Constitution (shown on the stamp above), the "German Empire is a Republic" and thus also the Weimar Republic is actually still the German Empire. In consequence the Michel Catalog also lists all stamps of the Weimar Republic (and the Third Reich) as part of the German Empire. Looking now in there one might notice that before 1919 only definitives were issued and the first actual commemoratives were issued for the opening of the Weimar National Assembly. Commemoratives however remained scarce until the Third Reich, when more and more were issued for propagandistic reasons. As I unfortunately do not have these stamps, here is an interesting recent postmark to illustrate this fact. It commemorates the centenary of the last Bavarian stamps, which were also issued during the Weimar era.
3 There was not only a Treaty of Versailles.
This is actually just a small note, but while learning history in school I always just heard about the Treaty of Versailles, so if anybody else does not know the others there were also the Treaties of Saint-Germain with Austria, of Neuilly with Bulgaria, of Trianon with Hungary and of Sèvres with the Ottoman Empire, which were all signed during the Paris Peace Conference. As result of the conference also the League of Nations and the International Labour Organization were founded.
4 Thuringia was founded in 1920.
While talking about the territory of the Weimar Republic, the main theme usually is the loss of territories after World War I, mainly Alsace-Lorraine and the territories which became part of a newly-independent Poland, so I think it is actually quite interesting to take a look at the inside. Just like the German Empire until then and Germany today the Weimar Republic was a federal state consisting at its high time of 18 Länder. An alteration during the formation time of the republic was the formation of Thuringia from seven of the eight Thuringian States (Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach, Saxe-Meiningen, Saxe-Altenburg, Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, Schwarzburg-Sondershausen, Schwarzburg-Rudolstadt, Reuss Elder Line, Reuss Younger Line; Saxe-Coburg voted to join Bavaria instead). Later on in 1929 the Free State of Waldeck with its glorious capital city Arolsen became part of Prussia. The rest stayed the same until after World War II. Although 18 Länder is not much more than the 16 of today, the map was completely different. Just compare a map of 1930 with one of today by youself!
5 The first President of Germany was legally a traitor to his country.
The justice of the Weimar Republic made some strange decisions. In general it can be said that right-wing crimes got away much easier than left-wing crimes. Examples include the murders of Matthias Erzberger and Walther Rathenau (Organisation Consul), Hitler's Beer Hall Putsch or the Leipzig War Crimes Trials. Especially strange I think is the trial of Friedrich Ebert in Magdeburg in 1925, which fined a journalist who had called Ebert a "traitor to his country" for his role in the January 1918 strike, but it also said that, legally, Ebert had in fact committed treason. This court case prevented him from seeking medical help for a while, as he wanted to be available to give evidence and was thus even a reason for his death shortly afterwards.
6 The Weimar Republic was a very free period for art, cinema, sexuality and in general.
It is not for nothing that the Weimar period is (in parts) known as the "Goldenen Zwanziger" (Golden Twenties), but due to its horrible end this can be easily forgetten. Nonetheless entire books could be written about the freedoms of the Weimar Republic, so here are just a few keywords and names if you want to know more: Alfred Döblin, AVUS, Bauhaus, Berlin Alexanderplatz, Berlin Night Life, Bertolt Brecht, Comedian Harmonists, Fritz Lang, Käthe Kollwitz, Magnus Hirschfeld, Marlene Dietrich, Max Beckmann, Max Schmeling, Metropolis, Neue Frau, New Objectivity, Otto Dix, Paul Klee, Thomas Mann, UFA Studio, ...
Just as a small reminder for last year's post about the Bauhaus and because the Werkbund Estates recently got the European Heritage Label, I thought I might include once again the modern architecture. Now I can also include a building I did not have a stamp of last year, the Barcelona Pavilion by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe. "The pavilion for the [1929] International Exhibition was supposed to represent the new Weimar Germany: democratic, culturally progressive, prospering, and thoroughly pacifist; a self-portrait through architecture" (says Wikipedia). This sounds like just another piece of modern architecture, but it becomes more interesting if you keep in mind that neither Germany nor Spain could really live out their free and modern image presented in 1929, as shortly after both Hitler and Franco came to power.
8 All German Nobel Peace Prize Winners are connected to the Weimar Republic.
Germany has four Nobel Peace Prize Winners. Ludwig Quidde (1927) was a politician and pacifist who is mainly remembered today for his criticism of German Emperor Wilhelm II and whose long career spanned four different eras of German history including the Weimar Republic. Carl von Ossietzky (1935) was a journalist and pacifist exposing the clandestine re-armament of the Weimar Republic. He later died in Nazi custody, who earlier already refused to release him to travel to Oslo to receive the prize. Willy Brandt (1971) spent most of his childhood during the Weimar period and later fled the Nazi regime to Norway and Sweden. As Chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany he helped to strengthen cooperation in Western Europa and to achieve reconciliation between West Germany and the countries of Eastern Europa. The most important winner for the Weimar Republic however was Gustav Stresemann (1926). He served as Chancellor for 102 days in 1923 and was Foreign Minister between 1923 and 1929. During a period of political instability and fragile short-lived governments he was generally seen as a factor of stability. His most notable achievement was the reconciliation between Germany and France, which was also the reason why he and Aristide Briand received the Nobel Peace Prize. His death in 1929 and the Great Depression marked the beginning of the end of the Weimar Republic.
9 Without the Weimar Republic the USA would probably not have been on the Moon.
The "Weltraumfieber" (Space Fever) in the Weimar Republic is not very famous and without a very interesting seminar in the winter semester 2018/19 I would not know about it either. During this seminar we read texts of famous space flight pioneers who promulgated ideas for spacecrafts and even made succesful tests. While they were mainly pacifist and planned to fulfil the humankind's old dream of space travel, they also included the vision of a new World standing for Germany. The ideas were later corrupted by the Nazis in Peenemünde with the construction of the V-2 rockets and after World War II scientists from Peenemünde came to the USA and the Soviet Union, where they helped to bring the Space Age. The most famous of these persons is for sure Wernher von Braun, who however only played a minor role during the Weimar Republic. If you want to know more search for Hermann Ganswindt, Hermann Oberth, Max Valier, Raketenübungsplatz in Berlin-Reinickendorf, Verein für Raumschifffahrt, Karl Debus, Werner Deubel, Reinhold Tiling, Hermann Noordung and Fritz Lang's Frau im Mond.
10 The Weimar Republic was not doomed to fail.
The Weimar Republic is usually thought from the end, which for sure is understandable, as no other failing state ended in the Holocaust, but that does not mean that this was the only possible end. During its short time of existence the Weimar Republic saw many crises and most of them the state survived. Just because it happened, does not mean it had to happen. Noone in the mid-1920s would have probably guessed what would happen shortly after, so we can not assume it. Historic processes are free and neither deterministic nor teleological. On the other side it was and is for sure important to take a look at the republic's weaknesses and the Rise of Evil to hopefully prevent that something like that will never ever happen again, but it is also possible to take look at the good sides of the Weimar Republic and I hope everyone who read this knows now that the Weimar Republic was not only a take-off ramp for Adolf Hitler but so much more.
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