Krems Synagogue - Krems macht Geschichte

Introduction

KremsMachtGeschichte invites you to learn about and engage with the history of National Socialism in Krems. As you move through the city you connect various historical sites with each other. A simple stroll creates a personal narrative that brings the places, themes and histories into the present and enables you to keep the past alive in your critical memory.

What does it mean to “make history”? In 1938 Krems became the capital of the Gau, or Nazi administrative district, of “Lower Danube”. This was a time when Krems was making history, but history of a kind many would like to forget today. Today, when we remember, when we name perpetrators and tell the stories of victims, when we make resistance visible and point out continuities, we’re participating in the writing of history in our society. History isn’t just written in schoolbooks and by historians and at universities; it’s continually being produced by our everyday actions. History happens in the here and now.

24 historical sites, marked by green pennants, form the stations of the KremsMachtGeschichte tours. Every site stands for a different event that has something to tell us about destruction, persecution and crime, as well as about responsibility, solidarity and resistance. Some roads lead to memorials that glorify the past and that today need some historical correction. Prominent positions in the cityscape are taken up by the court and the prison, places where Nazi violence was once inflicted but that today contribute to the functioning of democracy. Many sites of past events are unrecognisable as such today; only through your imagination can they come back to life.

The information about each place can be called up with any smartphone by using the QR codes on the pennants. Texts and images can also be found in the catalogue which is displayed at various places in the city. By taking a walk through the city, you’re already making some history. En route from site to site, the historical picture gradually becomes more intricate. Common themes emerge, each of which groups the sites in a new way and connects them with our contemporary world. The themes include “on Jewish life”, “on resistance”, “on persecution and punishment” and “on remembering”. The short texts under these titles give some initial ideas that you can question and add your own stories to on the empty pages of the catalogue.

The synagogue in Krems was consecrated in 1894. Designed by the Viennese architect Max Fleischer, the building combined the style of neo-Gothic churches with that of Renaissance townhouses and was particularly notable for its monumental three-level facade gable. At the time it was built, around 300 Jewish people were living in Krems.

After the “Anschluss” in 1938, the Jewish Community of Vienna (IKG) was forced to hand over the synagogue to the Nazi city administration. When the temple was “cleared” in September 1938, the Jewish people of Krems had to take part in a humiliating antisemitic spectacle. With numerous onlookers present, they were forced to play “hopscotch” with furniture and religious objects, all while being subjected to physical assaults.

The building survived the November Pogrom, cynically dubbed “the night of broken glass” by the Nazis, of 1938 because SA and SS units were afraid an arson attack might cause fire to spread to neighbouring buildings. Instead, these units took part in the destruction of the synagogue in St. Pölten. A bombing raid on Krems in April 1945 destroyed the railway station and the whole of the Bahnofstraße up to the synagogue, but the building itself remained largely undamaged.

In 1952 the Jewish Community of Vienna successfully reclaimed ownership of the synagogue. Just under twenty years later the organisation sold the land to the food cooperative Konsum and the bakery St. Pöltner Dampfbäckerei. The new owners had the synagogue demolished in 1978. Today there is a betting shop where it once stood.