[Below: This is a DAF (German Labor Front) course completion card. It says:

'Die Deutsche Arbeitsfront
Abteilung für Berufserziehung und Betriebsführung'

(The German Labor Front
Department for Vocational Education and Management)

'Teilnehmerkarte'

(Participant card)

Click to see inside!]

[Below: This 1937 NSDAP (non-member) insurance card says:

'Hilfstaffe der NSDAP
Hilfstaffen=Quittungskarte
Nur für Nichtparteimitglieder'

(Auxiliary of the NSDAP
Auxiliary=receipt card
Only for non party members)

Click to see inside!]

[Below: This 1934-35 NSDAP 'Quittungskarte' (Receipt card) says:

'Hilfstaffe der NSDAP
Hilfstaffen=Quittungskarte
Nur für Nichtparteimitglieder'

(Auxiliary of the NSDAP
Auxiliary=receipt card
Only for non party members)

Click to see inside!]

[Below: This card says:

'Ausweiskarte für das Mitglied der Reichshebammen schaft'

(Identity card for the member of the Reich Midwifery Association)

Around the symbol it says:

'Im Dienste der Zukunft Unseres Volkes'

(In the Service of the Future of Our People)

Click to see inside!]

[Below: This shows the back of the booklet and the cover. This card is dated 1936 and says:

'Mitgliedskarte der Uhrmacher=Innung Mittelfranken'

(Membership Card of the Watchmakers Guild Mittelfranken {region in Bavaria})

Interesting.]

Click to see inside!]

[Below: . This card is dated February 1937 and says:

'Die Deutsche Aribeitsfront und [...] "Kraft durch Freude"'

(The German Labor Front and [...] "Strength Through Joy")

Strength Through Joy was the most marvelous and generous social program to ever exist. Click to see inside!]

[Below: This card is dated August 1944 and says:

'Ausländerbetreuung der Deutschen Arbeitsfront
Beitragsquittungskarte'

(Foreigner Support of the German Labor Front
Contribution Receipt Card)

On the bottom of the card it says:

'Bei Ausscheiden des Ausländers aus dem betrieb ist die Beitragsquittungskarte
an die zuständige Verwaltungsstelle der Deutschen Arbeitsfront weiterzuleiten!'

If the foreigner leaves the company, the contribution receipt card
must be forwarded to the responsible administrative office of the German Labor Front!()

This card was for one of the millions of eastern people who volunteered to work in Germany. The company they worked for was called Frickenstein & Co., and currently there still is a company in Essen Germany with this name. Click to see inside!]

[Below: This NSDAP membership book is from July 1938. These are very cool and oddly rarely encountered. I guess the collectors who have these don't want to give them up, so you seldomly see them on the market. Click to see inside.]

[Below: NSDAP membership book #2. Click to see inside.]

[Below: Here's one you don't see often. This is a fest card for the German Singer's Association (Deutsches Sängerbund or DSB). It says:

'12. Deutsches Sängerbundesfest
Breslau, August 1937
75 Jahrfeier des DSB'

(12th German Singers' Association Festival
Breslau, August 1937
75th Anniversary of the DSB

On the ink stamp it says:

'Männergesangverein'

(Male Choral Society).]

[Below: At the top of this card it says:

'Hilfs Kasse der Nationalsozialist Deutschen Arbeiterpartei'

(Auxiliary Fund of the National Socialist German Workers' Party).

The tax stamp says:

'Gerling Konzern
Schießmarke'

(Gerling Group
Shooting mark)

I'm not sure what 'Gerling' means...?

This would appear to be some sort of NSDAP insurance for firearm shooting? Perhaps things like hunting accidents? Wait but I thought Adolf Hitler banned all the guns? Just kidding, the truth is he relaxed gun laws and many households had private firearms.]

*By 1938 Adolf Hitler and the National Socialist government had lifted and eased the very restrictive Weimar era gun laws. Below is an example:

Compare these laws to that of your country and learn just how free you are!

[Below: This is a membership book from The Deutscher Reichsbund für Leibesübungen (DRL), which was instituted in July 1934 as the official sports governing body of Germany. It says:

'Deutscher
Reichsbund
für Leibesübungen'

(German
League of the Reich
for Physical Exercise).

Click to see inside.]

[Below: Here's a Third Reich membership book you don't often see. This is for the 'Richard Wagner Bayreuther Bund' (Richard Wagner Bayreuth Organization). Bayreuth is a beautiful town in northern Bavaria, known for Richard Wagner moving there in 1876. In fact he lived there until his death in 1883. In case you care, Wagner loved dogs and had many throughout his life. His last dog named 'Russ' is actually buried next to him in Bayreuth.

But back to the booklet! I'm not sure exactly what this is for -- maybe a membership book for a musician? An actress? A singer? Click to see inside.]

[Below: The following cards were inside the above booklet. Let's take a look:

'Reichsgemeinschaft Deutscher Künstlerinnen und Kunstfreundinnen'
(Reich Association of German Women Artists and Friends of Art)

'Mitgliedskarte 1943'
(Membership card 1943)

Here we see Frau Lotte has signed the card. And... wait a minute, look under the symbol-cluster of letters. It says 'Rechnungsführerin' which means 'Account Manager' and has her name printed under it. So this is her personal business card. Okay, cool, let's move on. On the bottom it says:

'Mitglied der Reichskammer der Bildenden Künste'
(Member of the Reich Chamber of Fine Arts).]

[Below: This card is the same as the above, except it is from 1944. SEVEN Reichsmarks, still!? That was the same price as 1943. Here in the good ol' US of A we can be sure the price will have gone up. Nothing ever goes down or stays the same. It is a shark tank of everyone trying to milk and rip off the next guy.]

[Below: Here is another card. It says:

'Club Zur Vahr
Mitgliedskarte 1943
Frau Carl Shütte
Der Beitrag ist bezahlt mit Reichsmark
Diese Karte gilt als Ausweis und ist auf Verlangen vorzuzeigen'

(Club Zur Vahr
Membership card 1943
Mrs. Carl Shütte
The contribution is paid with Reichsmark
This card is valid as an identity card and is to be shown on demand.)

This Carl Shütte must be Lotte's husband. Interesting. Now to this Club Zur Vahr. Would you believe it is still around? It is! Club zur Vahr is a country club with a 9-hole golf course in the city of Bremen.
Could Mrs. Shütte ever have imagined that her country club card would be in the middle of the USA in 2023? Truly mindboggling!]

[Below: Here is another card from the next year, except this one is for Mr. Carl Shütte.]

[Below: I'm guessing this is a German Red Cross donation receipt. Let's take a closer look:

'D.R.K.
Name der Einheit
Empfangschein
Beitrag für D.R.K.
Name des Kassierers
Name des Einzahlers'

(D.R.K.
Name of the unit
Receipt
Contribution to D.R.K.
Name of cashier
Name of the depositor).

In the bottom right-hand corner is Lotte's sloppy signature! Maybe if she would have known that in 81 years this measly donation receipt (3 Reichsmarks!) would be scrutinized thousands of miles away in another country she would have signed it better! So bizarre, the strange destiny of some items. They say books have a destiny all their own, but certain items do too, just ask Lotte.]

[Below: This card says:

'Nordische Kunsthochschule Bremen
Winter=Semester 1936/37
Hörerkarte
für
zu den Vorlessungen des Herrn Dr. Curt Zimmermann
Montagsreihe
Preis RM 4/5'

(Nordic Academy of Fine Arts Bremen
Winter=Semester 1936/37
Audience card
for
the lectures of Dr. Curt Zimmermann
Monday series
Price RM 4/5).

Wait a goddamn minute! I just got done talking about how no prices go down or even stay the same in the greedy USA. Now look here: THE PRICE HAS GONE DOWN! Haha. Too ironic.]

[Below: This is a May 19, 1943 discharge certificate (entlassungsschein) for Johann Schreiner. Click to see reverse!]

[Below: This is a later discharge certificate, from May 5, 1944, for Johann Schreiner, it says:

'Wehrnummer (Army number)
Polizeil Meldebehörde (Police Registration Office)
Wehrbezirkskommando (Military District Command)
Ausmusterungsschein (Discharge certificate)
ist völlig untauglich zum Dienst in der Wehrmacht (is completely unfit for service in the Wehrmacht)'

I'm guessing that this soldier suffered a severe wounding in battle. Click to see inside!]

[Below: This is a postwar (November 24, 1947) hospital certificate for Johann Schreiner. It says:

'Staatl. Versehrtenkrankenhaus Interne Abteilung * Tegernsee Haus Sonnenhof

Vorläufige und unverbindliche Feststellung der Versehrtenstufe'

(State Hospital for the disabled, internal department * Tegernsee House Sonnenhof

Preliminary and non-binding determination of the level of disabled persons).

Furthermore it says:

'Nackendurchschuß mit Verletzung der Wirbelsäule und anschließender Nervenschwerhörigkeit re (Flüstersprache 50 cm) Ursache des Leidens Kriegseinsatz'

(Neck perforations with injury to the spine and subsequent nerve hearing loss re (whispered speech 50 cm). Cause of suffering: War service). Click to enlarge.]

[Below: This is another postwar (December 7, 1948) pension certificate for Johann Schreiner. It says:

'Benachrichtigung Vom 1. Januar 49 ab erhalten Sie auf Ihre KB=Rente einen laufenden Vorschuß von monatlich 33,50 DM'

(Notification: From January 1, 1949 onwards, you will receive a current advance of DM 33.50 per month on your KB=pension). Click to see reverse.]

[Below: Since we're on the subject of postwar Allied occupation documents, here is an ID booklet from November 28, 1945. It uses the same format and look as the Third Reich versions, but you'll notice they've gouged out the swastikas on the Third Reich ink stamps, which due to shortages they were still using, sometimes even years later. Click to see inside!]

[Below: Even though this was a large organization in the Third Reich these cards are pretty rare. This is for the 'Reichsluftschutzbund' (Reich Air Protection League). This card is from Westfalen (Westphalia). At the bottom it says: 'Streng persönlich!' (Strictly personal!).]

[Below: Back of card. The placement of these very strange stamps reveal that the card is from 1935/36. These stamps are overprinted 'R.L.B. Gelsen-kirchen', this stands for Reichsluftschutzbund Gelsenkirchen. Gelsenkirchen is a city in North Rhine-Westphalia.]

[Below: These are strange stamps. They are so crude-looking. Hmm... is it a man looking toward an eagle? It's interesting that they even say Rhine-Westphalia ('RHEINL WESTF'). You would think the RLB would have one type of stamp, instead of regional unique ones. Seems like a lot of unnecessary work.]

[Below: Phenomenal Kriegsmarine identity book. This is Karl Arend, a Corporal in the Kriegsmarine. He earned the Iron Cross 2nd Class, the Black Wound Badge, the Minesweepers Badge, the DRL Sports Badge in Bronze and the Romanian 'Crusade Against Communism' medal. After basic training he was transferred in June 1942 to the 1.Lehr-Flott., later renamed 1.Landungs-Flott., a Kriegsmarine instruction and landing boat unit, operating in the Black Sea (Sevastopol, Kertsch, Varna). The unit was disbanded in August 1944 and Arend was tranferred to the Linz Kriegsmarine arsenal (mine depot). This is a rare treat, any documents dealing with Black Sea Kriegsmarine personnel are scarce! Click to see within.]

[Below: This Wehrmacht identity book was issued to Walter Schmelzer, who was a battlefield medic. As you'll see, he was in some very brutal battles, including Moscow. The entries end on March 1944. This needs researched badly.]

[Below: This Luftshutz service book was issued in 1941 in Wilhelmshaven (a coastal town in Lower Saxony, Germany). Wilhelmshaven was subject to many bombings until the closing days of the war. The Luftshutz was an air protection organization in the Third Reich.]

[Below: You don't get much cooler than this book. It's a goat breeders (and small animals) association book! It's without argument and pretty much one of earth's undisputed truths that goats are the superior lifeform on this planet. The Third Reich obviously understood this fact.]