THE MOST IMPORTANT EVENT OF 1924 - PART ONE

​Remember the movie Chariots of Fire? Eric Liddell and Harold Abrahams, both world-class runners in the 100 meters were competing at the 1924 Olympics in Paris. Because of his Christian beliefs, Liddell refused to run in a 100-meter qualifying heat that took place on a Sunday, making it impossible for him to compete any further. However, a fellow teammate offered his place in the 400-meter race to Liddell, who had never competed at 400 meters. Liddell accepted and went on to win the gold in the 400-meters, while Abrahams won the gold in the 100-meters. It was a great movie.
 
In 1924, my father was four years old, my mother three; the Wrigley Building in Chicago was completed as the headquarters of the Wrigley Gum Company; two U. S. Army planes completed the first round-the-world flight, taking 175 days; and the first Winter Olympics were held in Chamonix, France, in February, with Norway winning 17 medals and Finland coming in second with 11.
 
In 1924, the Computing-Tabulating-Recording Company changed its name to International Business Machines Corporation (IBM); Simon & Schuster published the first crossword puzzle book; Nellie Tayloe Ross of Wyoming was elected the first female governor in the United States; and the Loeb brothers committed murder.
 
The most important event of 1924, however, was that Adolf Hitler was tried in a People’s Court of Bavaria, a state within Germany, and was found guilty of high treason.
 
Yeah, that wasn’t in my Top Ten, either. I knew that Hitler had spent a few months in jail, but didn’t remember anything specific about it. For all that is associated with Hitler, I never considered that any particular year was more significant than others.
 
But 1924 was more significant--unbelievably significant. Being arrested for attempting to overthrow the Bavarian state government was crushing to him at the time (first, that it had failed; second, that the common sentence for high treason was hanging), but the trial afterwards made Adolph Hitler into everything he wanted to be, and set the context for everything that we remember him for.
 
Looking at Hitler’s attempted coup, its failure, his arrest, his trial, his imprisonment, and the subsequent fallout made me interested in reading about Hitler, his beliefs, and his personality traits. I can only read what other people have said, but I have found him more dimensional than the typical caricature--the moustache, the slick-backed hair, the penetrating eyes, the shouting, the salute, the intense anti-Semitism, the pervasive evil, the psychopathic behavior.
 
He had, in fact, rather ordinary personality traits that sound familiar to me. He was socially clumsy, had lower class sensitivities, heavily resented the upper class, was embarrassed by body odors (he apparently farted a lot and took medicine for it), became a vegetarian and a hypochondriac, and was inept around women (maybe because he considered them inferior, but maybe because they made him feel small; I know that feeling).
 
He made jokes, but was more amused by other people’s jokes. He sometimes belly-laughed until he lost his breath. He had little regard for schedules and was habitually late for meetings (he would later require a full-time secretary to guide him through his day). He would stay awake most nights because he couldn’t sleep and then routinely stay in bed past noon. He wasted considerable time in idleness and caused others to waste their time as well. He was a famously bad dresser—wearing the same overcoat for years, using a tie until it frayed, having few clothes, never buying a new hat.
 
His best friend was his dog, a German Shepherd named Wolf. He was amazingly harsh and vindictive towards his companions, making him a solitary figure while still being desperate for attention. Not counting his mother, he was never emotionally close or even open to anyone. Even Eva Braun lived life at a distance. She was isolated until she was called for, kept apart from visitors, could only be around Hitler at his discretion, and was allowed few friends of her own. He wanted her focus to be on him only.
 
Rather than marching through his personal history, I have summarized some of his personality traits. As inadequate an approach as this is, you’ll see how the traits factor into his trial and imprisonment.
 
I want to emphasize:
 

1. His defiance of authority and deep resentment of people who knew more than he did. He resented those who were educationally, socially, economically, or militarily superior; he preferred “the common man”. A school teacher made a clear assessment of the fifteen-year-old student in 1904:

 
“I can recall the gaunt, pale-faced youth pretty well. He had definite talent, though in a narrow field. But he lacked self-discipline, being notoriously cantankerous, willful, arrogant, and irascible. He had obvious difficulty in fitting in at school. Moreover, he was lazy; otherwise, with his gifts, he would have done very much better…But his enthusiasm for hard work evaporated all too quickly. He reacted with ill-concealed hostility to advice or reproof; at the same time, he demanded of his fellow pupils their unqualified subservience, fancying himself in the role of a leader.”
 
      [He dropped out of school after the eighth grade. That was the extent of his formal education.]
 

1. His incredible memory. He filled hundreds of hours-long speeches with personal stories, history, events, people, places, images, metaphors, and context, all while never losing his focus on his goals and of his connections to his audiences, which were typically thousands of people. He knew his speeches like an actor knows a script, and performed them to remarkable success. He recalled details from books he had read years before, using the information to sound informed and knowledgeable. He amazed his generals with details from technical reports.

 

1. His passion for reading. He read constantly and indiscriminately, even at a young age. “Books were his whole world”, a childhood friend recalled. He carried books in his army knapsack during his four years in WWI. He especially liked philosophy, radical ideas, history, and historical heroes like Frederick the Great, Bismarck, and Napoleon. He revered the Nordic legends.

 

1. His passion for talking. A friend remembered that he was a non-stop talker, a “chatterbox”, dominating every conversation, and leaving no time for others to talk. He would talk about anything for hours at a time.

 

1. His being an incredibly gifted speaker. It was a discovery for himself and others, but, once he recognized his ability, he practiced for hours in front of a mirror, crafting his words, gestures, voice, and perfecting a passionate delivery. He innately understood his different audiences and could speak to thousands as if he were addressing each individual. Some people considered him a prophet.

 

1. His being an ardent devotee of mythology, fantasy, and ethnic purity. He idealized the German Aryan race, believing that it had been endowed with God-given gifts like intelligence, skill, honor, bravery, strength, courage, devotion and power; even the most common Aryan man was born to some level of royalty. From an early age, Hitler had fantasies of himself becoming the messianic leader who would lead the German nation back to its God-ordained greatness, while utterly defeating its enemies. He also thought of himself as a great artist and a gifted architect.

 

1. His unrestrained and unquestioned passion for what he believed. There was no middle ground; he viewed the world as black-or-white; middle ground was for cowards. He was a firebrand to some, a lunatic to others. He had an inner vision of his personal destiny, an unfailing commitment to his vision of a future Germany, and a willingness to ultimately sacrifice himself [and all others] in the quest.

 

1. His unquestioned belief in his intuition, even in the face of inadequate knowledge, information, or experience. He believed that he had an inherited mystical insight that allowed him to perceive the future.

 

1. His obsession with his own death, driving him to constantly to be aware that he might die. It made him take risks.

 
There are more traits, but these reflect the foundations of his behavior by 1919 and will resonate with what is said at his trial in 1924.
In the following four years, 1919-1923, Adolf Hitler would go from being a loner and “an oddball” to becoming one of the most powerful political figures in German politics.
 
He had learned radical political concepts while living in poverty in Vienna for five years, then moved to Munich and joined the German army, swept up by the fervor of WWI. He fought four years in the trenches of France and Belgium, then continued in the army until he visited a meeting of the German Workers’ Party. He was intrigued, supportive, and then obsessed with forming a new government based on Socialism.
 
His ability to debate the political leaders and to mobilize the group members was far beyond the capabilities of the others and he was asked to be their spokesman. The group changed the name to the National Socialist German Workers’ Party--Nationalsozialistischer Deutscher Arbeiterverein--abbreviated in German as the “Nazi” Party. Hitler accepted and soon rose to the leadership position.
 
The Nazi Party became the venue by which he catapulted himself into being a widely recognized, gifted speaker.
 
Meanwhile, Germany was readying itself for someone just like him.
 
In 1923, Germany was in economic, social, and political chaos. In the few years after 1918, the German government [now a democracy, as demanded by the Treaty of Versailles] had changed eleven times; frequent elections brought heated clashes between the more than forty political parties trying to gain seats in the German parliament; inflation had made a single egg cost 80 million marks, a pound of butter, 6 billion, a glass of beer, 150 million; millions of men were out of work; rampant violence filled the streets; the Communists were infiltrating the various levels of society; and then France suddenly occupied the Ruhr, Germany’s industrial center. It infuriated the German people, while its government only begged for their restraint.
 
Something had to be done. The humiliation had gone on long enough and things had to change. Mass demonstrations were held in Munich, demanding revolution; a coup was needed. The rumors began flying that one of the political factions was about to seize power.
 
On the evening of November 8th, 1923, one of them did.

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