Hitler's birthplace reopens as police station to deter neo-Nazi pilgrimage

The building where Adolf Hitler was born, near Austria's border with Germany, officially began a new life as a police station on Wednesday. Austria's government hopes the conversion will prevent it from becoming a place of pilgrimage for neo-Nazis.

After years of debate over the large terraced house in Braunau am Inn, Austria took compulsory ownership of the privately owned building in 2017. The government announced in 2019 that it would be remodelled and converted into a police station.

Even before the conversion, the only sign of the building's historical significance was a rock on the pavement from the Mauthausen concentration camp bearing the inscription: "Never again fascism", which does not mention Hitler.

The rock remains in place. The only sign added to the white façade reads: "Police".

"The aim was to prevent any association with Adolf Hitler, so as to strip it of that mystique," said Stephan Mlczoch, head of the Austrian Interior Ministry's history department.

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Cult of personality

That mystique was encouraged by the Nazis' cult of personality around Hitler, under whose rule the "Fuehrer birth house" became an art museum. Hitler lived there for only a few weeks after his birth in 1889 before his family moved away, Mlczoch said.

"Today's police, our Austrian federal police, is the exact opposite of the symbolism tied to this place. Our police stand ... for democracy and the rule of law," Interior Minister Gerhard Karner told the opening ceremony.

Passers-by often stop to take photographs, but their views on Hitler are usually not known. Local officials said there are now only "isolated incidents" involving visitors, fewer than before.

Never again, or let's forget?

The conversion has faced criticism, including from the Mauthausen Committee, Austria's main Holocaust survivors' organisation, which argues that a police station is an inappropriate use of the site and that more should be done to draw attention to Hitler's crimes.

"Every year at the Mauthausen concentration camp memorial there's a ceremony to say: never again. And in Braunau they're saying: let's forget as soon as possible," said Robert Eiter of the Mauthausen Committee and the Network Against Racism and Right-Wing Extremism.

For decades, Austria argued it was the first victim of National Socialism after being annexed by Hitler's Germany in 1938. It now acknowledges that Austrians were also perpetrators, but rarely elaborates beyond that.

Some local residents questioned the conversion.

"I would have preferred if they had done something else but it is what it is," said Irene, 74, adding that she would have preferred the charity to remain there.

Most, however, supported the move.

"It's great and a good idea," said estate agent Thomas Spreitz. "Every now and then there are (neo-Nazi) groups there, and now that's history."

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Adolf Hitler Hitler birthplace Austria Austrian history Nazi Germany Holocaust