German Christmas
Picture book for education in the Hitler Youth.
Christmas comes again‌
Everywhere in Germany there is joyous preparation for the most beautiful festival of the year.
Beaming eyes of children are captivated by the splendor of the shop windows.
When it is dark outside, mother’s fairytale book provides the most beautiful times and the Christmas season begins.
Our young boys and girls enthusiastically assemble Christmas objects.
Every package will bring joy to our soldiers.
Our ancestors celebrated Christmas as a festival of increasing light and the renewal of life.
The Christmas tree is an old symbol of life.
In addition we find: 1) Nicholas tree, 2) tree decorated with an apple, 3) Christmas pyramid
Many traditions for this time period have an ancient German origin.
Shooting into the air at Christmas time...
and Christmas playing of instruments.
Frau Holle brings presents.
We find figures from old traditions in Christmas baked goods:
such as the Christmas boar, or the rider on a white horse.
The Swedish Christmas goat as a decoration is also a Christmas tradition.
The church has moved the celebration of Christ’s birth into the traditional nights and expanded the existing local customs of that time into a Christian celebration.
The most beautiful picture of life, that of mother and child, has become Mary and the Christ child.
Frau Holle has become a guardian angel...
in Sweden she has become Lucia.
St. Nicholas appears instead of Wodan.
We celebrate Christmas while thinking back on the old German traditions...
as a return of light...
and renewal of life.
Christmas, days of joy...
in the circle of the family...
and in the company of the entire folk.
Our soldiers make the Reich secure. With the heart joined to the homeland, They celebrate a joyous Christmas on all fronts...
on the sea...
with the air force...
on the watch...
and in hospitals.
The Leader with his soldiers...
Christmas 1939 on the western front.
Producer: Youth Leadership office of the Reich for world training, Berlin W 35, KurfĹąrstenstr. 53