Article

Journal of Social Archaeology

11(3) 266–282
Dealing with difficult ! The Author(s) 2011
Reprints and permissions:
heritage: The case of sagepub.co.uk/journalsPermissions.nav
DOI: 10.1177/1469605311417054

Bückeberg, site of the jsa.sagepub.com

Third Reich Harvest

Festival
Mats Burström
Department of Archaeology, Stockholm University, Sweden

Bernhard Gelderblom
Hamelin, Germany

Abstract
From 1933 to 1937 the German National Socialist (Nazi) Party arranged an annual
harvest festival at Bückeberg, close to the city of Hamelin. The festival was one of
the symbolically most important celebrations in the Third Reich; at its height, more
than one million people are reported to have gathered there. A special arena, designed
by Albert Speer, was built to handle the large number of participants. Although exten-
sive remains of this arena have survived, local feeling has prevented them from receiving
official recognition as a historical monument. This article presents the Bückeberg
site and discusses the responsibilities of heritage professionals towards sites which
may have significance as testimony to the past but which are not actively championed
by the public.

Keywords
difficult heritage, Germany, local opinion, material culture, Nazi past

Corresponding author:
Per Mats Burström, Department of Archaeology and Classical Studies, Stockholm University, Stockholm
SE-106 91, Sweden
Email: mats.burstrom@ark.su.se
Burström and Gelderblom 267

How are we to deal with sites that are historically important but whose shameful
past is a political liability? What risks are entailed by granting them official status
as cultural heritage sites and making them more accessible to the general public?
Indeed, what risks are entailed by not recognizing them as historical monuments?
What consideration should be shown to local interests and opinion? And what are
the particular responsibilities of heritage professionals and the government? These
are all crucial questions in dealing with what has recently been labelled ‘difficult
heritage’ (Logan and Reeves, 2009; Macdonald, 2009).
An obvious example of sites that are historically important but heavily burdened
by their past are those connected with the Holocaust.1 In their influential Dissonant
Heritage: Management of the Past as a Resource in Conflict (1996), Gregory
Ashworth and John E. Tunbridge discuss at length the challenges of dealing
with this type of atrocity site for the fields of heritage management and tourism.
They also present a general survey of different types of ‘dissonant heritage’, and
make a distinction between heritage concerned primarily with victims and that
concerned primarily with perpetrators (cf. Long and Reeves, 2009: 77–8).
Other major contributions to the ‘difficult heritage’ field of research include
Places of Pain and Shame. Dealing with ‘Difficult Heritage’ (Logan and Reeves,
2009) and Difficult Heritage. Negotiating the Nazi Past in Nuremberg and Beyond
(Macdonald, 2009). The former is a cross-cultural analysis collating cases from
several continents, the latter an in-depth study of one particular site: the Nazi
Party Rally Grounds. We return to the Nuremberg case in the following since it
is historically closely associated to our own case study.
In this article we focus our discussion on the site of the annual Third Reich
Harvest Festival in Bückeberg, close to the city of Hamelin in Germany. Given its
importance in Nazi propaganda, the site is surprisingly little known. It is not
officially recognized as a historical monument. We believe that the case of
Bückeberg highlights some problems of general relevance in dealing with difficult
heritage, in particular the role of professional heritage managers vis-a-vis local
opinion.
One of the authors (BG) has lived near the site for almost 40 years and is a
prominent advocate of its value as a historical monument. As an activist for the
conservation of the site, he has first-hand knowledge about local attitudes and
political manoeuvring with regard to Bückeberg’s future, even as he himself
forms part of that manoeuvring.

Bückeberg and the Harvest Festival

In July 1933, Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels announced that arrangements
would be made for a state ceremony in the form of a harvest festival to take
place at Bückeberg.2 After the ‘Day of National Labour’ Mayday celebrations in
Berlin, and the Party Rally in Nuremberg, the Harvest Festival (Ger.
Reichserntedankfest) constituted the largest annual mass event arranged by the
Nazi Party.3
268 Journal of Social Archaeology 11(3)

Several aspects were taken into consideration when choosing the location for the
festival. First of all, the site was to be in Lower Saxony, supposedly ‘essentially
German soil’. Second, the festival grounds ought to be situated close to the river
Weser, which was symbolically important by virtue of being ‘German from its
spring to its estuary’. Furthermore, the site had to have good rail connections so
as to allow nationwide transportation of large numbers of people.
Bückeberg fulfilled all these criteria. Moreover, the convenient slope of the
mountainside made it particularly well-suited for the planned arena, and since
the land was owned by the National Forest Enterprise (Ger. Domänenland) it
could easily be put at the nation’s disposal. In addition, the Bückeberg area was
celebrated as the homeland of Horst Wessel, the Nazis’ most important ‘martyr’.
The choice of site for the Harvest Festival was accordingly justified by a mixture of
symbolical and practical reasons.4
Goebbels commissioned Albert Speer, Hitler’s chief architect, to plan a festival
arena on an unparalleled scale in this sparsely populated region (Figures 1 and 2).5
The arena was designed to use the mountain slope to achieve dramatic and visual
effects. Crucial elements in Speer’s design included:

. A colossal venue, measuring 600 meters in length and 300 meters in width, large
enough to accommodate a huge number of participants and visitors (more than
a million people are reported to have attended the festival in 1937)6
. An upper tribune (‘the honorary tribune’) situated at the top of the mountain
slope, featuring a large altar and seating for 3000 honorary guests
. A lower tribune (‘the speaker’s tribune’) situated at the foot of the mountain
slope, with a rostrum from which Hitler addressed the masses
. The Führerweg (the Führer’s way), a paved and elevated causeway through the
middle of the venue that connected the upper and the lower tribunes

Figure 1. Model of the Harvest Festival arena of 1934 as commissioned to Albert Speer. It
contains some elements that were never actually built. Photo: Bernhard Gelderblom Archive.
Burström and Gelderblom 269

Figure 2. Aerial view of the venue during the Harvest Festival of 1935. The ‘Führerweg’ can
be seen as a pale line running crosswise from lower-left to upper-right. The lines of flagpoles
surrounding the arena proper are also clearly visible. Photo: Bernhard Gelderblom Archive.

. A horseshoe-shaped formation of flagpoles, enclosing the arena and transform-

ing the visitors into a community.

Propaganda Minister Goebbels wanted the Harvest Festival to be experienced as

a joyful open-air celebration.7 All elements were to look authentically rural.
Present-day visitors to the site typically fail to appreciate the sheer extent to
which it has been constructed. In 1934, three labour camps were established that
deployed 450 men to work on the site all year round. In three years of gruelling toil,
they levelled the mountain slope and installed water pipes, electric cables, and
drainage. Extensive works were also undertaken to facilitate the arrival of trains,
automobiles and pedestrians. Future plans included the construction of a new
motorway.
From 1933 to 1937 the Harvest Festival was celebrated in Bückeberg each year
on the date of the Christian harvest festival, thus following on an existing popular
holiday. The Harvest Festival was presented as a folk festival, an event organized
by the ‘Volksgemeinschaft’. The plan was to attract not only peasants but towns-
people – men, women and children alike, from all over the nation. The first festival
was held in the evening with subsequent festivals starting around noon. After Nazi
Germany began rearmament in 1935, the festival’s military performance became
270 Journal of Social Archaeology 11(3)

increasingly important, but with this exception the celebration followed the same
general course of events every year.
The prelude to the celebration got under way early in the morning when
participants began marching from numerous railway stations and campsites. By
10 a.m., the festival site was supposed to be full of people. Meanwhile, Hitler flew
from Berlin to Hanover, continuing by car to Bückeberg via Hamelin. His journey
in a convertible car marked the start of a triumphal procession. On arriving at the foot
of the mountain slope at 12 noon, Hitler and his entourage entered the Führerweg and
walked uphill to take their places among the ministers and diplomats who were
already seated on the honorary upper tribune. The masses waiting greeted this
‘walk through the people’ (Ger. Weg durchs Volk) with deafening cheers.
Propaganda Minister Goebbels then officially opened the festival with a short
speech. This was followed by a military show on the valley plain below. In a large-
scale performance, tanks and bombers destroyed the so-called ‘Bückedorf ’, a
make-believe town erected by the pioneer corps. After the military show, Hitler
walked slowly back down the Führerweg to enter the speaker’s lower tribune. There
the Leader of the Reich Farmers (Ger. Reichsbauernführer) gave a speech, after
which Hitler finally addressed the masses. The festival ended with a rendition of the
Horst Wessel song and the national anthem.
The most important ritual element of the Harvest Festival was Hitler’s ‘walk
through the people’, which was intended to show his close relation to them. Just
walking these 600 metres took over 30 minutes, as children and women broke
through the cordon in order to deliver flowers, and Hitler stopped time and
again to speak with ecstatic participants, some dressed in traditional peasant cos-
tume. The causeway’s elevation, in tandem with the overall construction of the
festival arena, meant that almost everyone could see their ‘Führer’ regardless of
where he or she was standing.
The first Harvest Festival took place in 1933, but after only five years the celebra-
tion came to a sudden end. In 1938, the festival was cancelled at very short notice
because the trains designated to bring people to the festival were needed for another
purpose: the transportation of troops to Czechoslovakia. Within a year, the Second
World War had broken out. There were to be no more harvest festivals in Bückeberg.

After the festival

Aerial reconnaissance photos8 taken by Allied Forces in March 1945 show that all
the key elements of the festival arena were still in place. Shortly after, the site was
stripped of everything that could be put to practical use. The flat lower part of the
festival arena, which had made up about 30 per cent of the whole area, had been
reconverted into urgently needed agricultural land in time for the winter of 1945.
The sloping upper section of the festival site, which consists mainly of rocky soil
unsuitable for cultivation, was turned into pasture.
In the mid 1980s, detached housing was built in the upper region of the site along
the arena’s western edge. It is unquestionably an attractive place to live,
Burström and Gelderblom 271

commanding beautiful views of the surrounding countryside. The first house, which
was erected in the best location, was built by the former mayor of Emmerthal, the
closest municipality. The mayor has repeatedly voiced his fear that the festival site
might attract neo-Nazis, and claims, indeed, to have witnessed neo-Nazi activities
there.9 In the 1990s, more housing was added in the lower part of the grounds, this
time partly above the old festival arena.
All in all, it can be concluded that around 70 per cent of the area of the original
arena has been preserved in a way that allows the viewer to get an impression of its
original design, even though it is now difficult to fully grasp the enormity of

Figure 3. Satellite image of the festival site today (2005). Along the long southwest edge (to
the left) can be seen a line of houses; the northeast long side (to the right) of the arena is
clearly visible because of a line of planted trees. The site of the upper tribune is marked by a
thicket of trees and bushes concealing the concrete foundations. Photo: TerraServer.com.
272 Journal of Social Archaeology 11(3)

Figure 4. The ‘Führerweg’ seen from ground level. Photo: Mats Burström 2010.

its dimensions. The most readily discernible physical indicator of the nature and
location of the arena is the Führerweg, which is clearly visible even at a great
distance (cf. Figure 3 and 4). It appears as a long swathe of tall grass running
straight down the hillside. The causeway is 4–5 metres wide and is elevated as much
as one meter above ground level. The causeway is dotted with numerous cable
boxes of concrete. Electricity was needed for loudspeakers and for a radio broad-
cast, the latter made possible by an air balloon above the arena; the Führer’s voice
was to be heard ‘live’ across the entire Reich.
The concrete foundations for the honorary upper tribune have also been
preserved. Among these, as well as along the long eastern side of the arena, numer-
ous trees grow in straight lines, indicating an attempt at large-scale plantation at
some point. It seems reasonable to assume that this was motivated, at least in part,
by a desire to make the material remains of the arena less visible. Paradoxically, the
result is quite the opposite; thanks to the trees and bushes, it is now fairly easy to
identify the arena (cf. Figure 3).
In the near vicinity, there are also many remains of the infrastructure that served
the festival, such as the foundations for the labour camps, parking lots, paved
roads, railway stations, signposts, stairs, and waterworks. Nowhere in the area,
Burström and Gelderblom 273

however, is there any information to be found about the historical events that once
took place here.

Smelling trouble
Given its centrality for Third Reich propaganda, and the sheer numbers of people
attending its annual celebrations, the Harvest Festival site has an obvious historical
importance. Yet Bückeberg has not been given the status of an official cultural
heritage site, nor is it legally protected as a historical monument.
After moving to Hamelin in 1975, where he worked as a teacher, one of the
authors (BG) became interested in the Bückeberg site, offering as it did a pedagog-
ical opportunity to connect the larger history of the Third Reich with local history.
It turned out that almost none of his pupils had ever heard of the Harvest Festival,
nor did they know how important a role in Nazi propaganda it had conferred upon
their home district.
The festival represents an aspect of the Thousand Year Reich ignored in most
school courses, which typically focus on the crimes and atrocities committed by the
Nazi regime. Learning about the festival significantly increased pupils’ interest in
history, alerting BG to the potential of the Bückeberg site. He began giving public
lectures on the subject and curated a museum exhibition. After premiering in Hamelin
in 1999, the exhibition toured several other museums, most recently the historical
Documentation Centre at Obersalzberg, Berchtesgaden (2007–2008), and the
Documentation Centre of the Nazi Party Rally Grounds, Nuremberg (2009–2010).
In 2002, the Niedersächsische Landeszentrale für politische Bildung in Hamelin
convened an academic symposium on Bückeberg. Participants agreed on the
following proposals, which were presented to the press:

. Protection of the festival grounds as a cultural heritage site

. Preservation of the material remains (without any kind of reconstruction)
. Establishment of a documentation centre.10

The press release also emphasized the need for engaging locals in a dialogue
about suitable forms for remembering and presenting the Bückeberg site in the
future. Hamelin’s regional newspaper, the Deister- und Weserzeitung, summed up
the response of the county commissioner and head of the district administration,
Karl Heißmeyer, under the revealing headline ‘County Commissioner Smells
Trouble’ (Ger. ‘Der Landrat läuft Sturm’).11 The county commissioner announced
that he would block protection of the monument by any means available. His
arguments were as follows:

. In light of the 55 million deaths caused by the Second World War, he does not
wish ‘to see anything that glorifies the Nazi regime’
. Giving the site protected monument status would risk turning Bückeberg into
‘an object of pilgrimage by right-wing extremists’.
274 Journal of Social Archaeology 11(3)

Figure 5. Graffiti opposing legal protection of the Bückeberg site as a historical monument.
Photo: Bernhard Gelderblom 2008.

The mayor of Emmerthal at that time, Gerd Feldmann, similarly rejected the
idea of protecting the Bückeberg site, claiming that the site constitutes one of the
few places in the district suitable for land development and should be used for
housing. He added that he did not believe it should be protected as a monument
merely because Nazi activities took place there in the past.12
In 2003, the federal state government asked the Emmerthal district council for a
written statement of their opinion regarding Bückeberg’s protection as a historical
monument. The local authorities repeated their concern; they saw no sense in
putting a ‘green meadow’ under heritage protection, and added that the land
was needed for new housing.13 The new county commissioner, Rüdiger Butte,
echoed his predecessor by stating that he, too, had ‘grave concerns that the grounds
would become a pilgrimage site for right-wing extremists’.14
In 2008, some graffiti appeared on the road near the honorary tribune that looks
over the festival arena (Figure 5). Clearly related to the ongoing debate about the
possible protection of the Bückeberg site, it can be read as an expression of local
opinion: ‘KEIN DENKMAL DEN TÄTERN. GEDENKT DER OPFER!’ (‘NO
COMMEMORATION OF THE PERPETRATORS. THINK OF THE
VICTIMS!’).
Burström and Gelderblom 275

In 2009, a symposium on Bückeberg convened by the regional ministry of

science and culture in Hanover reached a consensus that the grounds ought to
be legally protected. Visiting Emmerthal later that year, minister Lutz Stratmann
emphasized that Bückeberg had a historical importance for the Third Reich period
similar to that of the Party Rally Grounds in Nuremberg. He remarked that he saw
no alternative to giving the festival site cultural heritage status – ‘unless we want to
make fools of ourselves nationwide’.15 Yet the minister does not want to inflame
local community opinion, and so the site remains unprotected. This offers a nice
illustration of the conflicts of interest generated by difficult heritage at the national
versus the local level. A site considered to be of national historical importance can,
at the local level, be seen as an embarrassment.

Local voices
An argument that has been used informally on repeated occasions to block legal
protection of the Bückeberg site is that the population of nearby villages oppose
such protection. It has been argued that local people do not wish to be associated
with the Harvest Festival and, with it, a shameful Nazi past. The graffiti from 2008
seem to support this claim. However, there has never been a serious inquiry into
how locals view the future of the Bückeberg site, making it difficult to evaluate
claims about local opinion. Even so, in interviews with people from the Emmerthal
area, a number of opinions come up repeatedly.
Some consider the whole idea of protecting the monument as nothing more than an
expression of political correctness, a negative example of Vergangenheitsbewältigung,
that is, Germany’s struggle to come to terms with its past. Those of this opinion
believe it is pointless to protect the Bückeberg site since it has no historical or
educational value. As one man in his eighties declared angrily:

It [the administration] is encouraging neo-Nazi pilgrims to discover Bückeberg! If

these people actually come, there could be serious riots. And if that happens, we
will remember the names of those who supported the idea of making Bückeberg a
cultural heritage site.

This somewhat threatening promise has doubtless deterred potential supporters of

the proposal to protect the monument.
There are also stakeholders who think that the festival venue should be used for
land development. While this suggestion is usually underpinned with utilitarian
arguments, the construction of houses on the site would, of course, also be a
way of literally covering up the past. Others believe that Bückeberg should be
protected as a historical monument but only if it preserves its current character
as a site of natural beauty.
There seems to be some difference of opinion among generations. Those who
witnessed the Harvest Festival as children tend to have fairly positive memories;
there was a great deal of activity and the celebration put their Heimat – their home
276 Journal of Social Archaeology 11(3)

district – in the national eye. But when the Bückeberg site attracts attention today,
it is usually because of its prominent role in Nazi propaganda. Older people tend
to resent this perspective since it colours their childhood memories with feelings
of guilt.

Figure 6. Countermarked Nazi symbols at the ruins of the honorary tribune. Photo:
Bernhard Gelderblom 2010.
Burström and Gelderblom 277

In general, younger people have a more open attitude about granting Bückeberg
the status of a historical monument. They believe this would attract tourists, to the
benefit of local business, and they complain about older people shutting down
discussion of the heritage issue by harping on about the risk of neo-Nazis.
However, a few incidents have lent credence to such fears. A former county com-
missioner, Karl Heißmeyer, claims that bouquets have been placed at the ruins of
the honorary tribune on Hitler’s birthday for ‘as long as he can remember’.16 In
2009, swastikas and an SS-symbol were carved into trees on the site of the honorary
tribune, only to be effaced by someone else in a gesture of ideological counter-
marking the following year (Figure 6).
The grove is popular with local children and adolescents, the latter most likely
being the author of the carvings. The carvings show, however, that people who
choose to express themselves through Nazi symbols do find their way to the site
despite the lack of any information boards. It is possible that this category of
unwanted visitors would indeed increase in number if the site were made more
accessible. Nevertheless, such right-wing extremists would at least have to come
into the open, where, as the countermarked carvings show, their views would not
remain uncontradicted.

Beyond listening carefully

Local interests and opinion are undeniably important factors that must be taken
into account by professional heritage managers and politicians in power, who need
to listen carefully and engage in dialogue with various groups in society about
what should be considered interesting or valuable in their neighbourhood. This
imperative has not always been recognized, and experts have too often acted
without considering public opinion. Listening carefully is not enough, however;
one needs to strike a balance between sensitivity and uncritical populism
(cf. Burström et al., 2004).
As experts, professional heritage managers have the qualifications and experi-
ence required for making sound decisions on an informed basis. As a consequence,
from time to time they will inevitably reach conclusions and make priorities
which differ from those being actively championed by the general public.
Heritage managers have a particular responsibility for sites which serve as testi-
mony of important events in the past but which are not looked after by the public.
We believe Bückeberg is one such site.
If Bückeberg had been a concentration camp or an extermination camp,
it would have been quite impossible to invoke local opinion in order to deny it
the status of a historical monument. Extermination camps – sites directly
connected to the Holocaust and the most atrocious crimes of the Nazi regime –
were officially recognized as of historical importance just a few years after the
end of the war. Auschwitz-Birkenau, for example, had a museum as early as
1947, and has been on UNESCO’s World Heritage list since 1979 (cf. Olesky,
2000; Young, 2009). Another example is the concentration camp Bergen-Belsen,
278 Journal of Social Archaeology 11(3)

just under 90 kilometres NNE of Bückeberg, where a number of memorials

were raised in 1946 and 1947 and where a documentation centre was opened
in 1966.
Yet it has proven much more difficult to deal with the sites of Nazi spectacles
that represented the well-polished façade of the regime. It could, of course, be
argued that the main purpose of heritage management should be to commemorate
the victims of the Nazi regime, and, accordingly, that no purpose is served by
preserving sites associated primarily with the perpetrators. Colin Long and Keir
Reeves have contended that heritage preservation is not about preserving the past
in its entirety but about remembering those aspects of it which we consider worthy
of remembrance, an argument which leads them to conclude, despite being heritage
professionals, that there is no reason to preserve Anlong Veng, a site in Cambodia
closely associated with the Khmer Rouge regime. In their view, this ‘perpetrator
site’ neither enhances our understanding of the Cambodian genocide nor helps to
commemorate its victims (Long and Reeves, 2009).
Our own position is that sites such as Bückeberg are important for an under-
standing of the Nazi regime’s power to impress and seduce the masses. If we ignore
them, Hitler’s path to power will indeed seem like a historical enigma, impossible to
explain or understand, encouraging the false conclusion that something similar
could never happen again.
An illustrative example of the problems arising from the material remains of the
well-produced public performances of the Nazi regime is the handling of the Nazi
Party Rally Grounds in Nuremberg. The massive size of the buildings and
marching grounds was intended to impress people and to speak directly to them
on an emotional level. Nazi leaders such as Hitler and Speer repeatedly referred to
architecture as ‘words in stone’ and ascribed it great ideological importance. Speer
also formulated his famous ‘theory of ruin value’ (Speer, 1970: 56) whose over-
arching idea was to build structures that, like the ruins of the Roman Empire,
would impress people, even in a state of decay after hundreds or thousands of
years.
The Nazi Party Rally Grounds in Nuremberg were addressed by heritage
protection legislation in the 1970s. The many difficulties associated with the
handling of this heritage have been thoroughly discussed by Sharon Macdonald
(2006a, 2006b, 2009). On the one hand, repairing and restoring the colossal build-
ings risked returning them to their former glory and imbuing them once again
with their original ideological symbolism and agency. On the other hand, allowing
the buildings to fall into ruin risked giving them the allure of ruin that Speer
had theorized. The proposed solution was that the buildings should fall into a
state of semi-disrepair but not total ruin. This meant that they should be allowed
to look ugly and uncared for; and they should be used for banal uses, such as
storage, and leisure activities like tennis and motor-racing. In this calculated
neglect and trivialization strategy, the buildings became forms of material resis-
tance to Nazi efforts to make architecture an agent of totalitarianism. At the same
time, as Macdonald (2006b: 120) has suggested, this putative strategy may be a
Burström and Gelderblom 279

post-hoc construction, ascribing intentionality to developments where there was, in

fact, little or none.
While the Rally Grounds in Nuremberg literally embodied the Nazi ideal of
architecture as ‘words in stone’, the site for the Harvest Festival in Bückeberg was
intended to give a quite different impression. It was explicitly stated that the festival
should seem to be taking place ‘in nature itself’. As we have seen, much construc-
tion work was required for Bückeberg to give this ‘natural’ impression.
Paradoxically, the site’s current state to some degree fulfils its designers’ intentions.
It should also be noted that the strategy of harnessing nature to counter the evil of
Nazism, in a kind of purification process, has been used on numerous other occa-
sions (cf. Macdonald, 2009: 91).

Wind of change
Bückeberg was meant to be a central place in the new world order which the Nazi
regime tried to implement through violence. Today the site is utterly empty and
silent. There are no women in traditional peasant dress screaming and greeting the
‘Führer’, no swastikas flying, and no sounds of marching and tramping of boots.
All that breaks the silence are the wind whistling and birds singing.
The historical background of the Bückeberg site and experiencing its present
state is thought provoking, and prompts one to reflect on the wind of change. Not
so long ago this spot was at the centre of everything, yet now it seems to have
dwindled to nothing; there is comfort to be derived from contemplation of how
little remains of Hitler’s grandiose plans for a Thousand Year Reich. But you have
to look beneath the surface – behind the trees – to realize that this site has a very
particular history.
This sharp contrast between now and then is a crucial issue when discussing
Bückeberg’s potential value as cultural heritage. Although information on the
Harvest Festival can easily be found in other kinds of documentary sources, none
can replace the unique feeling of standing on the actual site of the celebrations,
experiencing with all your senses the degree of change that the setting has undergone.
This is a total experience that goes beyond what can be mediated by virtual tech-
niques, and it is the potential for this kind of thought-provoking experience, rather
than its historical documentary value, that makes the Bückeberg site important.
If Bückeberg were to receive official recognition as a historical monument, it
would undergo the ‘heritage effect’ (cf. Macdonald, 2009: 3–4, 190), by which the
very conferring of heritage status is perceived as ascribing positive value to the
historical events in question, compounded in Bückeberg’s case by the oft-stated
risk that it will become a focus for right-wing extremism. These risks must be
balanced against the importance of presenting a site where the seductive power
of Nazi propaganda was staged and performed. It was here that the masses were
blinded and seduced, and without such sites the twentieth century would have
taken another course.
280 Journal of Social Archaeology 11(3)

Another consequence of the ‘heritage effect’ is that the character of the Bückeberg
site will inevitably change. At present, Bückeberg gives the impression of a non-
place, a site forgotten by history and practically unvisited. Something of this quality
will, of course, be lost forever if the site is presented as an official historical monu-
ment and made more accessible to the general public, complete with car park, infor-
mation boards, paved walkways, and perhaps even a kiosk selling ice-creams and
postcards. But even then, the site will retain the power of provoking visitors to reflect
– and, most importantly, it will do so for large numbers of people.

Acknowledgement
Mats Burström’s research forms part of the project Artefactual Memories, which is
supported by the Foundation for Baltic and East European Studies.

Notes
1. For an overview of how the Holocaust heritage has been interpreted and represented in
various European countries, see Karlsson and Zander (2004).
2. Deister- und Weserzeitung (Hamelin), 13 July 1933.
3. For a more detailed presentation and discussion of the Bückeberg site, see Gelderblom
(1998, 2002, 2009, 2011), and Sösemann (2000). The wider context of political celebra-
tions and propaganda in Nazi Germany is discussed in Reichel (1991), Thamer (1998),
Klimó and Rolf (2006), and Kühberger (2006).
4. Compare, for example, Regierungsrat Leopold Gutterer, who was responsible for the
organization of the festival, in Deister- und Weserzeitung (Hamelin), 17 September 1934,
and Karl Keese in Heimatblätter der Schaumburger Zeitung, 25 September 1937.
5. Völkischer Beobachter, 23 September 1933; Deister- und Weserzeitung (Hamelin), 22
September 1933; Minutenprogramm zum Reichserntedankfest, 1934, Stadtarchiv
Hameln, Nr. 1001.
6. Deister- und Weserzeitung (Hamelin), 3 October 1937.
7. Völkischer Beobachter, 23 September 1933; Deister- und Weserzeitung (Hamelin), 22
September 1933; cf. the writer Bernhard Flemes, Hamelin, ‘Volksfest in freier
Landschaft‘, Deister- und Weserzeitung (Hamelin), 19 September 1935.
8. The National Archives, Kew, Richmond.
9. Deister- und Weserzeitung (Hamelin), 12 June 2002.
10. Deister- und Weserzeitung (Hamelin), 10 June 2002.
11. Deister- und Weserzeitung (Hamelin), 12 June 2002.
12. Deister- und Weserzeitung (Hamelin), 12 June 2002.
13. Evangelische Zeitung online, 20 April 2003; Deister- und Weserzeitung (Hamelin), 26
July 2003.
14. Evangelischer Pressedienst, 10 July 2003.
15. Deister- und Weserzeitung (Hamelin), 3 December 2009.
16. Deister- und Weserzeitung (Hamelin), 12 June 2002.

References
Ashworth GJ and Tunbridge JE (1996) Dissonant Heritage: Management of the Past as a
Resource in Conflict. Chichester: Wiley.
Burström and Gelderblom 281

Burström M, Elfström B and Johansen B (2004) Serving the public. Ethics in heritage
management. In: Karlsson H (ed.) Swedish Archaeologists on Ethics. Lindome:
Bricoleur Press, 135–147.
Gelderblom B (1998) Die Reichserntedankfeste auf dem Bückeberg 1933–1937. Hameln: CW
Niemeyer.
Gelderblom B (2002) Die Reichserntedankfeste auf dem Bückeberg 1933–1937. Ein Volk
dankt seinem Verführer. In: Ein Volk dankt seinem (Ver)führer. Die Reichserntedankfeste
auf dem Bückeberg 1933–1937. Veröffentlichungen des Braunschweigischen
Landesmuseums Nr 102. Braunschweig: Braunschweigischen Landesmuseum, 19–61.
Gelderblom B (2009) Die NS-Erntedankfeste auf dem Bückeberg als Inszenierung von
Führerkult und NS-Volksgemeinschaft. In: Erntedank und ‘Blut und Boden’. Bückeberg/
Hameln und Goslar 1933 bis 1938. NS-Rassekult und die Widerrede von Kirchengemeinden.
Spuren Harzer Zeitgeschichte Sonderband 2. Clausthal-Zellerfeld: Papierflieger Verlag,
32–40.
Gelderblom B (2011) Hamelns Geschichte – abseits vom Rattenfänger. Available at: http://
www.gelderblom-hameln.de/bueckeberg/bueckeberg.html.
Karlsson K-G and Zander U (eds) (2004) Holocaust Heritage. Inquiries into European
Historical Cultures. Malmö: Sekel.
Kühberger C (2006) Metaphern der Macht. Ein kultureller Vergleich der politischen Feste im
faschistischen Italien und im nationalsozialistischen Deutschland. Berlin: Lit Verlag.
Logan W and Reeves K (eds) (2009) Places of Pain and Shame. Dealing with ‘Difficult
Heritage’. London: Routledge.
Long C and Reeves K (2009) Dig a hole and bury the past in it. Reconciliation and the
heritage of genocide in Cambodia. In: Logan W and Reeves K (eds) Places of Pain and
Shame. Dealing with ‘Difficult Heritage’. London: Routledge, 68–81.
Macdonald S (2006a) Undesirable heritage: Fascist material culture and historical con-
sciousness in Nuremberg. International Journal of Heritage Studies 12(1): 9–28.
Macdonald S (2006b) Words in stone? Agency and identity in a Nazi landscape. Journal of
Material Culture 11(1): 105–126.
Macdonald S (2009) Difficult Heritage. Negotiating the Nazi Past in Nuremberg and Beyond.
London: Routledge.
Olesky K (2000) The State Museum of Auschwitz – a selection of issues from the past and
the present. In: Schatz W (ed.) The Future of the Past. How Should the History of the
Third Reich be Transmitted in Museums and Memorial Sites in the 21st Century?
Nürnberg: Museum der Stadt Nürnberg, 169–176.
Reichel P (1991) Der schöne Schein des Dritten Reiches. Faszination und Gewalt des
Faschismus. München: Hanser.
Sösemann B (2000) Appell unter der Erntekrone. Das Reichserntedankfest in der national-
sozialistischen Diktatur. Jahrbuch für Kommunikationsgeschichte 2: 113–156. Stuttgart:
Steiner.
Speer A (1970) Inside the Third Reich. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson.
Thamer H-U (1998) Verführung und Gewalt. Deutschland 1933–1945. Berlin: Btb.
von Klimó Á and Rolf M (eds) (2006) Rausch und Diktatur. Inszenierung, Mobilisierung und
Kontrolle in totalitären Systemen. Frankfurt: Campus.
Young K (2009) Auschwitz-Birkenau. The challenges of heritage management following the
Cold War. In: Logan W and Reeves K (eds) Places of Pain and Shame. Dealing with
‘Difficult Heritage’. London: Routledge, 50–67.
282 Journal of Social Archaeology 11(3)

Author Biographies
Mats Burström is Professor of Archaeology at Stockholm University, Sweden. His
main areas of interest are the archaeology of the recent past and the relation
between material culture and memory. He has also been working with issues arising
from the ideology and practice of cultural heritage management.

Bernhard Gelderblom is a former school teacher and active local historian in

Hamelin, Germany. He has published widely on Jewish history and on the
Harvest Festival. For his historical work he has been awarded the
Bundesverdienstkreuz by the German Government and the Obermayer German
Jewish History Award.