In 1935 a card game was produced called the Führer Quartett Spiel (Leader Quartet Game) promoting the Nazi hierarchy and the achievements of the Third Reich. Published by Hausser, the game consisted of sixty cards of Hitler and other well-known leaders, buildings and scenes from the history of the Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (NSDAP) or Nazi Party. There were fifteen sets of four to collect, hence the name quartet, labelled A1–4, B5–9 etc. up to P57–60. The idea of the game, which was based on happy families, was to collect as many sets of four as possible after the cards had been shuffled and dealt.5
Führer Quartett Spiel (Leader Quartet Game) was produced in 1935 celebrating the Nazi leadership and their achievements. Containing sixty cards, they came in a stout box with a youthful Hitler on the front.
The cards came in a stout box with a youthful Adolf Hitler (1889–1945) on the front and the words ‘Amtlich genehmigt – Gesetzl.Gesch’ (Officially approved, all rights reserved) written in small print underneath. Apart from Hitler the other figures included the Deputy Führer Rudolf Hess (1894–1987), Head of the Schutzstaffel (SS) and the architect of the Holocaust Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler (1900–1945), Air Minister and Head of the Luftwaffe Hermann Göring (1893–1946), Propaganda Chief Joseph Goebbels (1897–1945), Youth Leader Baldur von Schirach (1907–1974), the Nazi ‘martyr’ Horst Wessel (1907–1930) and a range of military generals.
Among the buildings were the Braunes Haus (Brown House, the Nazi headquarters) and the Feldherrnhalle (Field Marshal’s Hall where the Nazi dead from the abortive 1923 putsch were commemorated) in Munich together with Hitler’s alpine retreat known as the Berghof on the Obersalzberg, above Berchtesgaden in the Bavarian Alps. Many of the cards showed Hitler from his days in Landsberg prison where he wrote his autobiographical book Mein Kampf (My Struggle). Others showed him relaxing at home with children and animals, his triumphal seizure of power when he became the Führer of the NSDAP and the twenty-third Chancellor of Germany in 1933 and his inauguration as Reich Chancellor in Potsdam.
The idea of the game, which was based on happy families, was to collect as many sets of four cards as possible. Part of the Führer cult, the cards portrayed Hitler as Germany’s saviour.
The card game was part of the Führer cult which portrayed Hitler as Germany’s saviour – the man who had rescued the country from the grip of depression and political chaos. In Nazi Germany, the cult of supreme leader was the embodiment of Hitler’s style of totalitarian power. Hitler’s rise to power owed much to the creation of his own celebrity status, the Führer believing himself to be a great artist and visionary architect as well as a father figure to the nation and the messianic savour of Germany. His position was cultivated and nurtured by Joseph Goebbels, Germany’s highly strung Minister for Enlightenment and Propaganda. Goebbels employed many modern forms of propaganda from radio addresses to mass rallies to promote the Führer. An important part of propagating the public adulation of Hitler was for him to be an ever-present feature in every aspect of German life, so producing Führer playing cards ensured that even when people were relaxing at home they thought about Adolf Hitler.
Another quartet game was Vom Weltkretg zum Dritten Retch (From World War to the Third Reich). The cards depicted the history of Germany from its defeat in the Great War to the rise of Adolf Hitler.
The game reached its zenith in 1940 when a pack was produced called Deutschland ist schöner und größer geworden’ (Germany has become more beautiful and larger) celebrating the expansion of the Third Reich.
Despite the Nazis exploiting the format, the game of quartet was popular in Germany long before they rose to power with sets being produced about innocuous subjects like flowers, people and cities. However, Joseph Goebbels ordered that all games should reflect Nazi ideology so after 1933 manufacturers responded by rushing out sets with a much more political focus. These covered all the armed forces as well as how Hitler had created a new Germany. They included forty-eight cards in the pack Vom Weltkreig zum Dritten Reich (From World War to the Third Reich) with a political commentary telling the history of Germany from its defeat in the Great War to the rise of Adolf Hitler.
The cards showed Hitler’s vision of a ‘Greater Germany’ as described in his book Mein Kampf (My Struggle). The quartet of cards showing Munich, the spiritual home of the Nazi Party.
The game reached its zenith in terms of Nazi propaganda in 1940 when a pack was produced called Deutschland ist schöner und größer geworden (Germany has become more beautiful and larger). The cards all depicted Hitler’s concept of a Greater Germany as described in Mein Kampf. With colourful photographs of cities and places, the cards showed the beauty of pre-war Germany but also how the Third Reich had expanded rapidly with the onset of war. They included scenes from the newly annexed regions of Poland, Austria and Czechoslovakia. The cards also chillingly showed artists’ impressions of how a victorious Germany would look after the war with the expansion of both Nuremberg where the Nazi mass rallies were held and Munich, the spiritual home of the Nazi movement. Shortly after Deutschland ist schöner und größer geworden was produced, Hitler invaded the low countries and France in his unceasing quest for an ever ‘Greater Germany’.