The exhibition highlights the suffering of the Geiershoefer family during National Socialism

The exhibition highlights the suffering of the Geiershoefer family during National Socialism

On May 28, 2025, the exhibition “The Long Shadow of Injustice” opened at the Catholic University in Eichstätt, which sheds light on the fate of the Geiershoefer family during National Socialist persecution. This exhibition is the result of intensive three-semester research work by students of modern and contemporary history and journalism under the direction of Prof. Dr. Vanessa Conze. A total of over 5,000 pages of source material were viewed and evaluated in order to develop a microhistorical perspective on the persecution and its aftermath. The focus is on the people involved, the different time levels and the complex topics of persecution, expulsion and the post-war period.

The results of this project work are not only presented in the current exhibition, but also published in the monograph "The long shadow of injustice. National Socialist persecution and its aftermath - the example of the Geiershoefer family". Anyone interested can visit the exhibition in the foyer of the KU University Library until June 21, 2025. Future presentations are planned in Ingolstadt and Allersberg, while a podcast, in collaboration with Bayerischer Rundfunk, is also available.

The persecution of Jews under National Socialism

The exhibition aims to expand and deepen conventional narratives about the persecution of Jews under National Socialism. This persecution began systematically after the Nazi Party came to power in 1933, when state discrimination against the Jewish population in Germany was aggressively pursued. Anti-Semitic thinking was a central basis of National Socialist ideology. Adolf Hitler announced the “extermination of the Jews” early on, which laid the foundation for the later policy of terror and extermination.

A highlight of this persecution was the November pogrom of 1938, also known as “Night of Crystal Night”. That night, over 1,400 synagogues and Jewish prayer houses were destroyed, hundreds of Jewish shops and homes were demolished, and around 100 Jews were murdered. This state-orchestrated act of violence set in motion a wave of repression that led to the confiscation of all Jewish assets and the exclusion of Jewish people from economic life.

The progressive violence and the Holocaust

From 1941 onwards, the Nazi leadership, especially the SS, put the announced “extermination of the Jews” into practice. It is estimated that around 5.7 million Jewish people from occupied European countries were systematically murdered. People were gassed and burned in extermination camps, while firing squads murdered large numbers of Jews on site. The Holocaust, as the most radical genocide in history, not only represents the extermination of the Jewish population, but also the simultaneous murder of Sinti and Roma as well as people with disabilities.

The exhibition at the KU and the accompanying publications are intended to not only remember this dark part of history, but also to raise awareness of the serious human rights violations and the people behind the numbers. Initiatives such as the Stolpersteine ​​laid by Gunter Demnig since 1995 remember the victims and open up space for individual stories in the context of the major events of the past.

The example of the Geiershoefer family therefore represents a concrete field of research that illuminates the history and personal experiences of people who suffered under the National Socialist regime. Their story is told in a place where science and memory come together and can contribute to a better understanding of the past.