Abstract

Young Germany

During the years 1922-1923 one read a great deal about the German Youth Movement. During the years 1925-1926 one read a great deal less about it, and the general impression was that it had divided, dissented, and died. Consequently, it was a little surprising, in the first week of 1928, to find a sky-sign across the front of the Leipzig station reading, "Visit the Young Germany Exposition," and to discover that in less than a month over 45,000 people had obeyed that injunction. The great majority of visitors were school-children who came in their class groups, but aside from the unemployed, who were admitted free, 12,000 tickets were used by adults, so that the spontaneity of a large part of the attendance seemed unquestionable. When one looked about at the people who were in the exhibition at any given time one saw, too, how widely the interest was distributed. Bourgeois with circumferential watch-chains, workers in rough clothes and shabby overcoats, deaconesses in starched white caps, scores of young men and women from twenty-five to thirty, all these were there in addition to hordes of small boys. It was obvious that the youth of Germany is still a matter of public interest.