I visited Nürnberg yesterday and it was quite sobering. We read about the Second World War and we see the movies and the documentaries, but it doesn’t compare to standing in Zeppelinfeld, the same place as Hitler and the throngs of people dedicating their lives to him in the arena where Nazi rallies were held. Touching the granite and limestone is like touching that horrible history, almost hearing the crowds proclaim their love for a single genocidal, megalomaniacal man.
It’s quite a different feeling than simply reading that Germany invaded Poland in 1939.
I also visited the courtroom where the Nürnberg trials were held after the war. The history was tangible, almost like the ghost of Göring was breathing down my neck. My parents and in-laws lived through that war, and Beth and I missed it by a decade. The temporal distance lessens the feeling of horror. For us, it was stories. For our parents, it was more than just headlines – it was the stories from the front, the news of relatives escaping a world gone mad, enlisting to fight in a war that made no sense.
But standing there, touching the stones, it hits you in the face. Do you feel the distance?
There are debates about what to do with these monuments to terror. The majority hold that should be preserved as tangible history, and I agree with them.
Memoirs of an Earthling 