A new travelling exhibition featuring the LBI’s Library of Lost Books project has arrived in Dortmund, shining a spotlight on football’s entanglement with the National Socialist regime and inviting visitors to reflect on the importance of remembrance 80 years after the end of the Second World War.
The exhibition, titled Gedenkanstoß – denk Erinnerung weiter (“Kick-off for Remembrance – Take Memory Further”), is on display at the Deutsches Fußballmuseum until 19 May. Organised by the Foundation Remembrance, Responsibility and Future (EVZ), the project aims to make the lessons of the past relevant to new generations by connecting them to the world of football.
At the heart of the Dortmund exhibition are stories of local clubs and players whose lives were upended by Nazi rule. Borussia Dortmund, the city’s most famous club, is among those highlighted for having expelled Jewish members and officials during the 1930s. The exhibition also pays tribute to those who resisted, including Heinrich Czerkus, a club groundskeeper who was executed in 1945 for his opposition to the regime.
Interactive displays guide visitors through the era, illustrating how football stadiums and pitches across Germany were not just sporting venues, but sometimes sites of forced labour and persecution. The exhibition draws on recent research, encouraging visitors to consider how traces of this history remain in the urban landscape today.
Dortmund is the first stop on a six-city tour that will see the exhibition travel to Bremen, Chemnitz, Pasewalk, Karlsruhe, and Nuremberg over the coming months. Each city will tailor the exhibition to explore its own local history, drawing on the findings of the Gedenkanstoß MEMO study, which examines how Germans today view the legacy of National Socialism.
A special event at the Deutsches Fußballmuseum on 19 May will bring together historians, activists, and football fans for a public discussion on the ongoing relevance of this history.
For more information on the exhibition and its upcoming locations, visit the Deutsches Fußballmuseum or the EVZ Foundation’s official website: https://www.stiftung-evz.de/gedenkanstoss/
