Hitler at school: childhood photographs
W–069
Adolf Hitler stands among his classmates in the back row, his arms folded across his chest. He was about ten in this Leonding school photograph. The full image is dated 1899. The town’s history places his family’s move to Leonding, near Linz, early that year. His father Alois had retired from the customs service, and Adolf was still attending primary school.
In autumn 1900, Hitler entered the secondary school on Steingasse in Linz. At the end of his first school year, 1900/01, he failed mathematics and natural history and had to repeat the year. He later wrote that his father wanted him to enter the civil service, while he wanted to become an artist. This was how he later presented the conflict in his memoir.
Alois died in 1903, and Josef Mayrhofer, the head of Leonding’s municipal administration, became Adolf’s guardian. The following year, his mother transferred him to the secondary school in Steyr. He left school altogether in autumn 1905. Two years later, Hitler applied to the Vienna Academy of Fine Arts and was rejected. His mother Klara died in December 1907. He moved to Vienna early in 1908 and left for Munich in May 1913.
Hitler entered politics after the First World War. In 1919, he joined the German Workers’ Party, soon renamed the National Socialist German Workers’ Party. By mid-1921, he was its leader. On 30 January 1933, President Paul von Hindenburg appointed him chancellor. Hitler used his power to turn Germany into a one-party dictatorship. On 1 September 1939, Nazi Germany invaded Poland, beginning the Second World War in Europe. Under Hitler’s leadership, the Nazi regime perpetrated the Holocaust: the persecution and mass murder of Europe’s Jews.
In late April 1945, Soviet troops approached the Berlin bunker where Hitler was staying. He dictated a political testament and a personal will. On 30 April, he died by suicide.
Photographs and documents
1. Black-and-white portrait, Linz
Sources and provenance for frame 1
An extract supplied by the owner from the photograph of class 1.b at the secondary school in Linz. The full print bears the imprint Atelier Wimmer, Wien; the photographer is unidentified. The 1900/01 school year follows Hermann Möcker, ALWS, 2001, pp. 79-80. The exact day is unknown.
Full scan: NARA, NAID 162123894, 242-HF-1091, Image 1. The catalogue states Access Unrestricted, Use Unrestricted. This describes the archival object; no Creative Commons licence is asserted for this supplied digital copy. The black-and-white file was submitted on 1 October 2026. Its digital processing history is unknown, so it is not described as an archival original.
772 × 762 px. Submitted bytes preserved unchanged; separate WebP preview. Full photograph record.
NARA: full class photographFile on WITNESS · 772 × 7622. Modern AI reconstruction
Sources and provenance for frame 2
Creator: ChatGPT, according to the version supplied by the owner. A modern synthetic reconstruction of an extract from the Linz class photograph, submitted on 1 October 2026. The exact model and processing settings are unknown. Colours, textures and reconstructed details were produced during processing and do not establish historical appearance. The historical photographer did not create this version; no Creative Commons licence is asserted.
1254 × 1254 px. Submitted bytes preserved unchanged; separate WebP preview. Historical reference record.
Historical reference: NARAFile on WITNESS · 1254 × 12543. Extract from the class photograph
Sources and provenance for frame 3
Historical photographer unidentified. Digital reproduction from the submitted file; its Wikimedia Commons record states public-domain status. This is the record’s status, not a new WITNESS licence. The extract’s file record gives circa 1900; Album / akg-images dates the full photograph to 1899.
600 × 273 px. Submitted bytes preserved unchanged; preview without additional cropping. Source record.
Wikimedia CommonsFile on WITNESS · 600 × 2734. The full class photograph
Sources and provenance for frame 4
Historical photographer unidentified. Digital reproduction from the submitted file; its Wikimedia Commons record states public-domain status. This is the record’s status, not a new WITNESS licence. Commons credits Bayerische Staatsbibliothek and a publication by Ian Kershaw, 2008. The original negative has not been inspected.
2980 × 2299 px. Submitted bytes preserved unchanged; preview without additional cropping. Source record.
Wikimedia CommonsFile on WITNESS · 2980 × 22995. School in Linz, 1900/01
Sources and provenance for frame 5
The mount bears the imprint Atelier Wimmer, Wien. This names the studio, not the photographer; the Vienna address does not establish where the photograph was taken. Hermann Möcker identifies the group as class 1.b of the secondary school in Linz, in the 1900/01 school year (Austrian Ludwig Wittgenstein Society, 2001, pp. 79-80). Library of Congress, LC-USZ61-1428 / LOT 3641, dates its copy to June 1901 and warns that old caption-card data are unverified. Commons gives 4 September 1900; that exact day has not been independently confirmed. The school year is used here.
NARA, Record Group 242, Miscellaneous Photographs, NAID 162123894, local ID 242-HF-1091, Image 1. Catalogue: Access Unrestricted, Use Unrestricted. This is the stated use status of the item; it does not establish US-government photographic authorship or constitute a Creative Commons licence. Full scan: 4662 × 3500 px. Source bytes preserved unchanged; separate uncropped WebP preview.
NARA source file; Hermann Möcker, 2001; Library of Congress.
National Archives, 242-HF-1091File on WITNESS · 4662 × 35006. Accompanying archival sheet
Sources and provenance for frame 6
Accompanying material from the same archival item, NARA Image 2. The sheet bears a school-photograph designation and archival reference. No exposure date is entered, although the Datum line contains a handwritten annotation. The catalogue does not establish the sheet’s physical relationship to the print, so it cannot be identified as the photograph’s reverse.
NARA, Record Group 242, Miscellaneous Photographs, NAID 162123894, local ID 242-HF-1091, Image 2. Catalogue: Access Unrestricted, Use Unrestricted. This is the stated use status of the item, not a Creative Commons licence. Full scan: 1117 × 848 px. Source bytes preserved unchanged; separate uncropped WebP preview.
National Archives, 242-HF-1091File on WITNESS · 1117 × 848