Reuters —
The building where Adolf Hitler was born near the Austria-German border will officially begin a new life as a police station on Wednesday, but the Austrian government hopes the conversion will prevent it from becoming a pilgrimage site for neo-Nazis.
After years of debate over the traditional large terraced houses in the town of Braunau am Inn, which were privately owned and housed by a disability charity, Austria announced that they would be compulsorily purchased in 2017, renovated and turned into a police station in 2019.
Even before the conversion, the only sign of its historical significance was a stone placed on the sidewalk of the Mauthausen concentration camp inscribed with the words “Never allow fascism again,” with no mention of Hitler. The rock remains in place. The only sign added to the white facade reads “Police.”
“The aim was to prevent any connection with Adolf Hitler and to strip it of its mystique,” Stefan Murzoch, director of the History Department of the Austrian Ministry of the Interior, told reporters during a tour of the building.
Its mystique was furthered by the Nazi personality cult of Hitler, during whose reign the Führer’s Birthplace was a museum. Mr. Murzoch said Hitler only lived there for a few weeks in 1889 before his family moved away.
Passersby often stop to take photos, but their views on Hitler are usually unknown. Local officials said there were now only “isolated incidents” involving tourists, fewer than before.
He did not provide details, but Hitler salutes and other Nazi symbols are banned in Austria.
Asked about public reaction to the plan, Mayor Johannes Weidbacher told Reuters: “I think the people of Braunau will generally accept and accept this plan.”
Weidbacher was on a committee that recommended the building be used for charitable or official administrative purposes. After all, he said, having a charity based there would make it more accessible to the public.
“I don’t think it’s a bad approach, but we’ll have to wait and see if it works as well as we all hope,” he said.
Some opponents, including the Mauthausen Committee, Austria’s main Holocaust survivor organization, say the police station is inappropriate and that more should be done to draw attention to Hitler’s crimes.
“Every year there is a ceremony at the Mauthausen concentration camp memorial where we say ‘never again’, and in Braunau we say ‘let’s forget as soon as possible’,” said Robert Eiter of the Mauthausen Committee and the Network Against Racism and Right-Wing Extremism.
For decades, Austria has claimed to be the first victim of National Socialism since it was annexed by Hitler’s Germany in 1938. They now claim that Austrians were also responsible, but rarely elaborate further.
“The world will never forget where the worst mass murderer in history was born. Wikipedia will not change its entry,” Eiter said, adding that the number of neo-Nazis making the “pilgrimage to Braunau” will not decrease.
Some local residents had doubts about renovating their homes.
Irene, 74, said: “I wish they had done something else, but that’s the way it is,” adding that she would have preferred the charity to stay put.
But most people were cooperative.
“This is great and a good idea,” said real estate agent Thomas Spretz. “Sometimes there are (neo-Nazi) groups there, but now that’s history.”
