Memory places of Nazi history at the Bauhaus-Universität Weimar

Science – Administration – Nazi Crimes. The „Thüringische Landesamt für Rassewesen” 1933-1945

The Thüringische Landesamt für Rassewesen (Thuringian State Office for Racial Studies) was located at Marienstraße 13 and 15 from 1935 to 1945. Here, the population of Thuringia was recorded and controlled according to racial ideological criteria. Forced sterilizations and murders of the sick and those with disabilities were supposedly legitimized by the scientific work of this institution. 

The 'Landesamt für Rassewesen' was deeply involved in National Socialist crimes.

The 'Landesamt für Rassewesen' was both an authority of the state of Thuringia and a scientific institute of the University of Jena. The Institute in Jena was responsible for advising the State Office on racial policy issues and providing scientific support. Other departments included forensic biology and the psychiatric archive.

The Responsible

The 'Landesamt' was founded on 15 July 1933 in Weimar's Brennerstrasse. It was expanded in 1935 and moved to Marienstraße. Initially, it had a budget of 12,800 Reichsmark — six years later, this increased to almost two million Reichsmarks. By then, 42 people were employed there.

The director, Karl Astel, was a National Socialist sports physician from Schweinfurt. He had been a member of the SS since 1934 and was a confidant of the Thuringian Gauleiter Fritz Sauckel and SS chief Heinrich Himmler. He believed that individuals with illnesses and disabilities should be excluded from the 'Volksgemeinschaft', a nationalistic and racist idea of the German society under the Nazis.

Other employees at the State Office included Lothar Stengel-von Rutkowski, who headed the institute in Jena, Fritz Carl Nikolai, Werner Neuert, Hein Schröder, Heinz Brücher and the well-known statistician Erna Weber. Eduard Wirths, who later became the site doctor of the Auschwitz concentration camp, completed an internship here in 1936. 

Astel and Stengel-von Rutkowski were honorary judges at so-called hereditary health courts, which arbitrarily decided on the admissibility of marriages and forced sterilizations. The legal basis was provided by the ‘Law for the Prevention of Hereditarily Diseased Offspring’, which came into force in 1934. 

By 1945, a total of around 16,000 people in Thuringia had been made infertile against their will.

The Landesamt and the City of Weimar

The Murder of Erika Haase

The daughter of a single Jewish mother, Erika Haase was born in Weimar in 1936. Immediately after she was born, Erika went to live with the Schölzel family in Karlstraße. The new foster family was considered ‘Aryan’ by the Nazis. 

When Erika was just two years old, the 'Landesamt' turned its attention to her case. In an expert report, the agency explained why Erika was not allowed to stay with the foster family. Their rationale was based on racist generalisations, assumptions and insinuations. The ‘Landesamt’ accused the little girl of having an allegedly 'unfavorable hereditary prognosis' — an arbitrary decision in any case.

The authorities then looked for a family that would be more suitable for Erika in the eyes of the state office. This meant a family with Jewish roots. As this was unsuccessful, Erika stayed with the Schölzel family and started school in 1942. 

But in 1944, the stigmatization and persecution of the now eight-year-old girl ended in her murder. She was deported to the Hadamar killing center. The nursing staff at the institution murdered Erika at the end of March 1944 with an overdose of medication. 

Through its bureaucratic activities, the state office was directly involved in this murder — as in thousands of others.

A Prestigious New Neighbourhood

At the end of 1937, Friedrich Fleischer died at age 76. Jenny Fleischer-Alt remained in the house together with four elderly servants. In 1938, Jenny‘s sister Ilka Gál also sought refuge there together with her 56-year-old daughter Edith. 

From 1939, the authorities began to gradually revoke Jenny Fleischer-Alt's right to manage of her own assets. The building had to be registered together with the furniture. She was only granted access to meagre monthly sums with which she had to run the household. 

In April 1939, the Nazi government passed the “Law on Tenancies with Jews”. This meant that Jews were no longer free to choose their place of residence. 

The house at Belvederer Allee 6 became a forced Jewish home in 1940. 

The local authorities now forcibly assigned Jewish people from Weimar to the house. In 1940, this affected Käthe Friedländer and Martha Kreiß, and in 1941 the cellist Eduard Rosé had to move in. For a year, up to ten people lived in the house, subject to the arbitrariness of the Gestapo and other authorities. 

Fearing further repression and humiliation and in view of the deportation already announced for May, Jenny Fleischer-Alt, like her niece Edith, committed suicide on 7 April 1942. 

The villa was evacuated: Käthe Friedländer died in the Belzyce ghetto, Eduard Rosé in Theresienstadt, and Martha Kreiß committed suicide.

No Simple Outcome

In 1942, the villa was confiscated and the furniture was auctioned off or seized by the Weimar tax office. 

In 1943, the municipal hospital set up an isolation ward in the adapted building. 

From around 1954, the villa was used by VEB Talsperrenbau, a dam construction office. 

In 1979, the Marxism-Leninism faction of the University of Architecture and Civil Engineering Weimar moved into the building. Compulsory courses on the political indoctrination of students took place here. 

After German reunification, the faction disbanded in 1992 and the building was renovated. Since then, it has been used by the university administration. 

In 1996, the artist Marion Trimbuch-Mentges created the installation 'Die Kauernde' (The Cowering One), which addresses the history of the building. A memorial plaque was placed at the entrance in 2000 and the 'Stolpersteine' (stumbling stones) were laid in front of the building in 2008.