Disability Studies and the Legacies of Eugenics

HADAMAR JULY 15

(Transcript originally completed for accessiblity purposes and should not be considered a verbatim account of the proceedings. This transcription is meant to represent a general sense and may include gaps and mistaken information. Please request permission to quote)

We met Frau George when we were here 2 years ago and she was so nice and knowledgeable that we wanted to come back. And she is very interested in us as a group and in what we’re doing. And so we’re going to go around as a group and check in. We’ve all been traveling for 5 days and we thank you for having us and we feel that it is an honor to have access to your expertise.

I’m very happy that you’re here and you are very warm and welcome.
Kanta: I’m particularly interested in how memory is staged and what’s at stake with recovering history.
I’m Rebecca Maskas and I just finished my diploma at the U of Bremen and I’ve been interested in disability rights and I studied with David and Sharon for a year and that’s how the connection came about. And I’m also interested in the history of eugenics and the reasons for the whole ideology.

Nancy: asst. professor and teaches. My primary research interest is American eugenics and especially the framing of (?)

Sara Vogt; PhD student in dis studies in Chicago. About to start researching for dissertation on the various roles that women play in various eugenics programs – I’m interested in getting my hands on anything about eugenics and especially the women who have played any roles –

Rosemary – teaches in women’s studies and English and Am literature – and interested in the rationale for euthanasia both in Germany and in American culture. Emory in Atlanta? Do you know it? Yes

Debjani – works for center for bioethics – trained as a psychologist and post doc training in bio ethics. Interested in the historical and cultural factors from the period in which we’re working now, how they affected material practices not just in Germany but in the US– more interested in how current climate was affected.

\David Mitchell: Influence of American eugenics on German eugenics – when we were here last time we made a film at the Bernburg area—

Sally Chivers – asst. prof of Canadian Studies. Research on public uses and abuses on pwds in Canada – interested in the affects on Alberta region

Nicole – associate professor – teach Lit and dis and a bunch of other things – has mainly been writing on representations of dis – but now very interested in eugenics

Sumi – teaches at MCLA – teaches dis and culture, culture, health, and illness, and interested in how bodies are constructed in nation-state – also social movements and global movements and how they operate locally

Adrienne Asch – social psychologist and social worker – has done lots of dis rights work and I teach bioethics courses at Wellesley and I’m interested in how the history of eugenics in Germany affects Am bioethics

Ingrid – a PhD in child development at U of Minn – I’m German. I’m interested in this institute because I grew up in Germany – and I asked questions –

Sandy O’Neill
Social and clinical psychology – did my dissertation on this topic – 0ne of the moves is to label these as eugenics crimes and not to discuss immigration to killing us – different restrictions placed on disabled persons – intersections that come together in eugenics – asocials and Jews and at an international level. Some of the newer research looking at the fact that pwds were also in camps and in territories and this will reconfigure holocaust studies if we insert the reality of ableism. I’m currently looking for work and teaching and I’m on the mayor’s committee on living with dignity.

Brenda: OSU – my home in English but I also hold appts in Women's Studies and American Studies and I coordinate ASL. My work has been in deaf studies and disability studies – my new book called Mapping Deaf Genes.

Can you tell us about yourself?

Uta¨ studied sociology politics and Spanish and I have worked here for 10 years and my main job is to work with groups but I also do research in a historical way and do research in pedagogy – how to work in groups – people with mental disabilities – how they can come here and work here. and she works with People First in germany. We worked together last autumn and since then we’ve had a quite close collaboration. This is in the german memorials, as far as we know Hadamar is the only memorial that has such an offer.

I once presented at a conference about this topic and I had very bad experiences because people would say that this was not necessary – that people with mental disabilities, that we have a concept that they can work here – that they can know about euthanasia crimes and what otherwise is very difficult – concepts of simple language – (????)

David: how did you understand the resistance or why people did not want that?

Because I think there is not a lot of integration and normalization in Germany so usually people who do not have disabilities-- they feel distant. So I think this is the main reason is that there’s no practice in dealing with people with mental disabilities. And they thought it might be a topic that would be too hard to take. When we had this seminary last autumn we had very good experiences and the people who came here they chose the way they worked and we worked very successfully and so we liked it.

Adrienne: why do you think it’s okay for people in Germany to learn about holocaust history and not about pwds?
I think I don’t understand.

Reb: she was just talking about the way in which her concept of facilitating the institutional information for pwd, how this information was rejected by a lot of people because, for dd persons, this will shock them and hurt them. Adrienne is saying – why does this info not go out to the public?

Ute: because we think the victims of euthanasia crimes – they have very little lobby and representation – so we talk about them as the forgotten victims So the Hadamar memorial was opened in 1983 and it was the first memorial that opened and began to work. Since then many still do not know about it. Even people who live near here, and even teachers, do not even know what happened.

Who was most instrumental in setting up Hadamar as a memorial? It started from the hospital here – it was a hospital since the war and the medical director was a social worker. Because this basement, where the T4 killings were carried out, it was used as a normal basement after the war and so the knowledge about what had happened here was forgotten. And then many young people worked here and they did not know what had happened even just 14 years before. And then in the US holocaust movie Hadamar was mentioned. Then young people looked in the basement and they found records and there was a student group from Frankfort and they wrote a book and then a group from Giesen made the first exhibition and then after a few years a welfare group in charge of children also took an interest.

Until 1983 this was a gerontology institution and persons lived here who had survived 1942 -1945 and then the responsible bodies said this is no longer possible and then these rooms were changed into conference rooms and offices and then the exhibition was put here. Of the persons who lived here from 1942 to 1945 – 5,000 persons died by starvation or died by overdose – when US army came on 26 of March 1945 they found about 422 survivors.

What about the US Holocaust movie? Made for TV movie miniseries for 12 weeks in 1978 to 79 – it came to Germany – it was about a family called Weiss a Jewish family and what happened to them. Their daughter in the movie was raped and then she came to Hadamar and she got a psychiatric disease. The movie was not correct in a historical way but it mentioned Hadamar. I grew up in Giesen – and I knew about it from this movie – just that it mentioned Hadamar as an episode. But this movie was very important because families looked at a movie like this and they talked about it – it was a movie and not a documentary but it had influence on the way to deal with German history.

I think we have to see now how we want to structure the afternoon – so because we can and I suppose you would like to go to the basement and also the Hadamar memorial has a graveyard where the victims of the years 1942 to 1945 are buried but it’s not easily accessible. So we have to talk about it if we want to go there. I said it will take a while to get everyone up there. And I said as a group we can decide. Going to the memorial, looking at archives. I will talk about Hadamar – and then we go to basement and then we have coffee. We have the records of the patients who stayed here the victims but also pwds who were here before the war – A psych hospital since 1920s – 1943 to 1945 Of the victims who were here from 42 to 45 – some were forced laborers from Ukraine, those who had a psych disease or tuberculosis, and children with one Jewish parent who were killed because of this parent – people who were "asocials" or who did not fit into society – also – old people – because they needed the hospitals that were at the frontline to be field hospitas. Also when the war came to the German population they also needed hospitals, for example cities were bombed – so they used the geriatric homes and psych hospitals like Hadamar. They took the patients who stayed here, of course there were pwds and p with psychiatric diseases, some of them stayed here for weeks or years even . Those who could worked in the kitchen or the garden – the invisible or unnotable . Those who needed aid or help or asked a lot, those were killed in a few days. In the other killing centers people were transported in order to die – in the T4 years – January to august 1941 – people were brought here to be killed, in the same day. And in this time they killed more than 10,000.

Brandenburg the exception because not a psych hospital but a prison and it was right in the center of town – Grafeneck which opened at the same time as Brandenburg – there was nothing – the next town is 5 kilometers away—we know from Hadamar keeping these places hidden was not so important. It was chosen because of the Autobahn and because of the train station and because it was nearly empty at this time. But the chief of the welfare institution was informed of these deaths and he wanted to participate and he gave Hadamar as a killing institute to T4. And he gave all the other institutions in his district he as interim locations and he was in charge of all those institutions – his name: Fritz Bernota. Do you know about what happened to him? – he vanished – he lived near Folder which is not very far from here and he lived there and then he died in the 50s and people always thought that something had happened to him and in the 50s when he was dead his wife asked for a pension and this is how persons found out where he had lived. He was not a physician but an administrator and he probably continued working – he was never tried. Did his wife get the pension? I think so. It would be typical that she got the pension. Because this is the case for physicians and their relatives – even thought that participated – Kuhl the Nazi connection – She discusses how she did get her pension – Q: who determined who got pensions? In general this was an act of administration so they said if they had paid enough then she would get it. Not a decree but simply an administrative act.

This is the area affected by Hadamar: at Lunburg quite in the north near Hamburg and nowadays in the states of Germany it was the whole state of Hessen and the Saxonies and in less than 8 months they killed 10,000. They came to Hadamar only from interim institutions. At Grafeneck the victims sometimes came directly, but this had to do with relatives not knowing. Hadamar was the last killing center that was opened so it probably had the most advanced killing technology. The difference between it and the others – the others went on with the program of "wild euthanasia" but Hadamar in 42 to 45 had a very special function because persons brought here were from all over the country from psych places that closed. These locations sent those patients it had to get rid of them. And Hadamar was an institution where 80 percent who came here were killed. By not giving them nutrition or giving them overdoses. And it made good profits with this model because they received the money from the patients who came because they received the funding for those persons. And it was the only one in Germany but there’s one in location in Poland that has same function --- just killing centers – Polish place like Hadamar =meseritz-obrawalde .

At Brandenburg – until now there was no working memorial – all the others have working memorials now who have groups and most of them also have exhibitions with information about what happened. Grafeneck is an exception because the building was destroyed in the 1970s . so there is nothing but they have a graveyard and a memorial site and about 100 groups visit each year, so they also are working. And the interim institutions?– in the last 20 years there has been a lot of research in Germany in T4 but also every psychiatric hospitals – from most of these clinics some were victims of T4 and at most of these staff killed people by medical overdoses. We know that if you want to say a certain psychiatric hospital had no murder take place – that just it not true – maybe at some, but only a very few – but saying this doesn’t make it so (??– at Idstein – medicine but also children’s station (kinds of killing for these different places) – pediatric ward??)

There were locations all over the country for recently born children – these were places where children were killed – so called treatments – but it was really research with the children and then they killed them.

Eisburg – hessen – children – other people were killed too –

Interim institutions? Much less numbers – Hadamar 15,000 people but Ichstein 2000 so much less because of the gas chamber – makes for more deaths –

Were there other centers in Europe that you’re now finding out about? Not as far as we know except Poland – because this part belonged to Germany before. As far as it’s investigated we don’t know but we know that the region that was former Germany and now is Poland until 10 years ago it was not possible to get something from archives.

18,000 at meseritz – obrawalde near Frankfort ober –

Hessen is really a state of Germany where there has been a lot of research and also a lot of memorials – and not in every part of Germany, but in Hessen the psychiatric hospitals have all done research and there exists an exhibition or a book and usually also a memorial site. Do you have materials from other memorial sites here? Yes. From Hessen. Well, l we have in Germany for all sites – books – but no Central committee for investigation of crimes.

(?) – used as a phony center – did the same registration things – was an extension of T4 at the psych hospital – near Warsaw – Phony things like they’d transferred people there but report says that’s what they had trials on – we know they killed people shooting them in asylums .

what do you know about the psychiatric hospital Eglfing haar -- ? Not a lot – I would have to look – I know there was a physician who became very famous because they found out only a few years ago that he participated in euthanasia crimes, but does nothing specific –

From 1942 to 1945, are these records that reflect back on diagnoses before they arrived here?

We’ve been talking about a kind of funneling effect – all kinds of disabilities – 8 categories – that all become funneled into psychiatric institution – labeled and then killed. The records – usually persons have been to other institutions before and the patients have been to several institutions before. But they also tell about their state of mind or being before they came to this institution. But most of the record is what the staff wrote down but also lots of letters – insurance or by someone who is a guardian or in charge of the person. How true are the records? What we’re learning is that people were killed and the reasons were all false – including the letters that went to their families –Q: Do you have a way that you can read the true information from the info that’s used to cover up their killings? – Yes

Ute : believes that the former institutions have accurate records because they’re evaluating them not to be killed. When they came to Hadamar the physician wrote in the records for 3 days – first day: “Mr. x is not feeling good. Day 2: still not. Day 3: died of "y". "Y" was a diagnosis that was false and not why he had come to the psychiatric institution. And it’s the same in all the records. Same pencil. Same manner of writing. And also this physician told about it in trial. It could be a coincidence that one victim really died like he wrote it. Maybe there was a person who really died of a heart attack when he came here.

Rosemarie: would there have been earlier records on that same diagnosis – the records that came with him?

Usually record of all the time that he spent in psychiatric hospitals – so a record about all of this time from the first day.The exception were the forced laborers who were killed because they had tuberculosis. This was a singular murderer event because they were not patients and these men were sent here with the idea to get rid of them. And their records are short – half a page where the physician wrote down his 3 sentences.

Sandy: A couple of questions. Gallagher reported some time ago – he wrote "By Trust Betrayed" – there have been reports about resistance by patients here – how much has been done in the surrounding areas to see what people in that age group will recall? 10kdeath party was here at Hadamar. What if any has been done in terms of talking to the people who lived around the institution to see about patients protesting? Resistance? Able to get people in village to also complain? Can we talk to that age group before they’re gone?

People who talked about what happened here-- this was dangerous. They were threatened to be sentenced to death or to go to concentration camp. And this happened to a woman who worked in Limburg and she agreed to questioners that it was true about the deaths in Hadamar and one of her colleagues told the Gestapo about this conversation and so she was sent to Frankfurt and then to Ravensbruck and this was meant to threaten the population.

Q: And there were other places that people protested? Any records of these protesters? No she’s mentioned in the exhibition but we don’t have her record. Some researchers have asked population here – but the population is not happy with the memorial because the Hadamar citizens feel that it is stigmatized and accusing and they would rather forget-- people don’t feel comfortable with the topic.

Q: How do you know persons are upset with memorial? There is a brochure about the city telling about what you can do here. And the memorial appears in one sentence. And it tells the address: there you can experience “the darkness of history” but doesn’t say what time etc. It sounds like 16th century or something. On the website of Hadamar and the town there is very little information – internet forum where you can post comments and then people upset about that if there’s any mention – why do we have to deal with that? People who work in the hospital – not easy for them to come here – people from Hadamar have worked there for generations and still work there and for them this is not very easy. This is a typical pattern. “because you can hardly advertise a concentration camp as a tourist site” : Dacchau has the same problem with the memorial – it’s called the “dacchau effect” the city has a big problem with the memorial. And I think that they also could be very proud. It could be just the other way around if they would accept that history has to be dealt with.

Rosemary: We have similar problems – I live in Atlanta – in the city there was an exhibition of African Americans being lynched and there’re was an enormous discussion about whether these photos should be shown – and the same conversations –

Brenda: brochure for the town – on the page about past and present and history –

Brochure from town :13,000 visitors a year. And each group is getting a guided tour and an introduction and the exhibition and some discussion and each group that comes here is here about 3 hours at least. And we also have groups that stay and we work in the afternoon and we work on special topics. And then sometimes persons do what you’re doing. And last year we had 400 groups who came for this.

Q: Frau Hoffman in Bernburg had a general assessment of student reaction – any differences between able-bodied students and disabled students? How do students react who come in to find about this? How do they respond?

Ute: we try to tell all the persons to please prepare the group but the problem is that many do not prepare the group in any way.

So they say – we just started with the topic – national socialism and others say oh we’re just starting to talk about Jews and concentration camps and this is not a good base because the victims are not Jews and they don’t hear it and at the end, after talking for 3 hours – they’ll ask where are the hair pieces? (???? Unclear to transcriber)

If they’re well-prepared – they do make good connections with the present – if they’re not they don’t get anything – they need to know who were the victims and what the role of Hadamar was.

Contact issue: little or greater contact with persons with disabilities – maybe that’s a difference between east and west. Maybe in west germany they have more contact then in east germany. This is not an item for us to say – maybe some have not had contact but they’ve thought about it.

Q: Were many of the people who came here sterilized?

We don’t have records on 1933 to 1942? Q: Do we know the death rates? There were doctors who went ahead and started killing – 33 to42 – (?)

Q: What do current patients think about memorial site? Do you know how current patients view the site?

Actually we don’t know enough. We know that very seldom they come – groups for patients who live here or stay here for some time – this has happened very few times. Hadamar now has a big part in psychiatry where people come who have been sentenced and they’re sent here because of an addiction – alcoholism or heroin– and they’re sent here if it is decided that they committed this crime because of the addiction – so if you look around you’ll see that there is a lot of barbed wire – it’s between a prison and a psych institution – they don’t have a diagnosis but an addiction and they’re sent here and this is the reason why they’re here for therapy. If they don’t pariticpate they go to prison and if they’re in therapy they’re allowed ground privileges ( my term) and then town privileges.In Germany if you commit a crime and if it’s determined that it’s related to your addiction your sentence can be modified if it’s related to your addiction and some stay in therapy for many years instead of going to prison. Deb: there are similar things in the US . not guilty by reason of insanity and then instead of going to prison you go to place like this where you have to get treatment.

Q:Translated into English? Some in English but not specifically to Hadamar. We have a documentary film from the BBC about deaf people killed in euthanasia crimes and they also came to Hadamar – Brenda: this is the one that Larry Hart has been working on – it’s not done – prescreening – it was based on a traveling exhibit – I know the person who’s producing the film. It’s not 90 minutes.

Ute has a film here already and it’s from the BBC and we can see it. Q; Do you have a video archive? Yes we have some videos. Q: Do you have the propaganda films from the period? We don’t have pure propaganda films but we have films where we show that have sections.

Q: How many groups of pwds come here? Very little. Until now there was no special advertisement –many times they didn’t think about it… also we don’t have good access to the basement – so that’s a problem – so there are some – maybe about 5 in a year. Q: Are these groups from other institutions or advocacy groups? From People First there came some and sometimes they come from schools that have an integrated concept where there are some students with disabilities. They’re coming more and more.

We also have copies of the records. They’re not organized – we have several copies of one record. If you don’t need the names – if you just want to look at the records – and we have from children some and we have some from certain regions – for example from Weimar – and this is because persons from these areas came here and they asked if there were records from their town – and this would be a possibility and you could even take them with you this evening because there are copies. We can see the original tomorrow. I’m interested in children and specific diagnoses. We’re interested inthe different kinds of diagnosis – not one category and the range – some diagnosis – schizophrenia – deformity – feeblemindedness deafness, dwarfism, depression,

Q: On the whole – who were responsible for keeping the records? Male doctors? Social workers? Nurses?

I don’t want to make you pull everything out of the archive – you can have a look at all those – if I give you the copies – you can also have them – it depends on the record – not the diagnosis – it’s hard to rule out –
Blindness – cross-disability –

Seeing as many of the videos that you have – some of the videos are only in a big wheel – do you have the killing films? That I can give you – so you can take it home? Do you mean tonight? And it’s in English and it’s captioned and it’s in sign language and it’s three languages.

Sharon L. Snyder, Ph. D.,
Director, "Legacies of Eugenics" Summer Institute, Einstein Forum
Assistant Professor, Interdisciplinary Ph. D. Program in Disability Studies
Department of Disability and Human Development
University of Illinois at Chicago (MC 626)
1640 W. Roosevelt Rd. #207
Chicago IL 60608-6904 U.S.A.
E-mail: ssnyder@uic.edu Phone: (312) 413-1975 (Voice) Fax: (312) 996-0885