Corey Frye

Professor Tonya Wertz-Orbaugh

UWRT 1103-005
11-19-14
A Wolf in Sheep Clothing: How Hitler Rose to Power
Adolf Hitler is definitely a name that everyone knows. He has had a huge impact on
history and through the deeds he did he made almost caused a mass genocide of a group of
people just because of their religious beliefs or because of the blood that ran through their veins.
When I hear is name, I instantly feel anger and hatred for his actions. He was able to persuade an
entire nation that they were the superior race and every other race in inferior and deserve to die.
Through this he captured millions of people, killing most of them, and then caused the Second
World War by disturbing a time of peace. He definitely left his mark on this world for years to
come, and through his and his nations actions we have learned what to do in the future so that
this situation wont happen to us again.
Adolf Hitler, in my eyes, had a pretty normal childhood. Most people think that such a
corrupt adult would have had a disturbing or terrible childhood but Hitler had a normal
childhood. Adolf Hitler was born Alois and Kalra Hitler in Branau, Austria April 20, 1889. This
actually surprised me when I first learned about this years back because I automatically assumed
that he was born in Germany since he became such a powerful leader of the country. Adolf Hitler
had always been interested in the fine arts and he even wanted to go to college for it. His father,
Alois, however did not like this and would much rather want his son to go into business. He

thought that this was a much better move and that fine arts were a waste of time. Adolf kept
pursuing this dream of the fine arts even went onto schooling to learn more about the arts. His
father died in 1903 and 2 years after his mother let him drop out of school. He then moved to
Venice and got a job doing the normal things a laborer would do and to make extra money he
would paint with water colors and sale his creations. However, he was not able to make enough
money to support himself and was forced to go to a homeless shelter where he continued to sale
paintings to earn money. This really humanized Hitler to me. This showed me that he was not
always the monster that we think of him as today. He once loved beauty and probably had a kind
heart. This is one thing that a lot of people dont like: humanizing the monster. People dont like
to think that Hitler had a soul. People want to just think of him as a soulless creature who only
hated when in reality he was a normal person who loved. In fact later in his life he found love. I
once saw a video where he was flirting with his soon to be spouse and then I read the comments
underneath it and people were getting furious since the video was humanizing Hitler; however, I
feel like this is a really important thing to understand when looking at Hitlers life. (Adolf Hitler
Bio, Early Years)
The question I asked myself when learning all this information is how a normal guy
become such a monster? I think he started to become inhuman when his brother, Edmund, died
in 1900. After this Hitler became very introverted and secluded himself away from the rest of the
world. I think the next thing that hardened his heart was when he lived in the homeless shelter he
felt like this was one of the lowest parts of his life. The biggest thing that made him so cold is
when his mother died. He felt worthless and he hated how he thought people took pity on him.
He was really close to his mother and so when she died he started hating even more and just
started to feel powerless. He did not like feeling powerless and it only got worse as he stayed

there through the years until World War 1. Before this war he was already interested in the
German Government, and so when the war came around he decided to sign up for the German
military. This is when the Austrian started to truly love Germany. Hitler was never on the front
lines but he was there at very many battles, and was even injured in the battle of Somme. For his
bravery Germany rewarded him greatly. He became respected and this is where his name started
to surface. This was also the time where Hitler started to hate other countries around the world.
He felt like Germany wronged when it was forced to give up land as a result of World War 1.
Through all these experiences Hitlers love for Germany kept growing while his hatred of the
rest of the world kept growing. During this time I honestly think that Hitler needed psychiatric
help. He went through so much within a short time. He lost his father, he dropped out of college,
and he was even homeless. Through all these events he started to hate the world and those
feelings only intensified when he went to serve in the army. Since Germany gave him purpose
again, he clung to them and loved them as the country raised him back to health and so he loved
the country since it didnt turn its back on him. Then I think he knew that he got some political
power and name recognition when he was decorated with all those medals for being so brave in
the army. Hitler just kept getting darker and darker and his hatred grew every day.(Adolf Hitler
Bio, Rise to Power)
The next question I have is how did the monster become a leader of a whole nation? I
would think that the people of Germany saw how evil he was and they wouldnt have given him
any power. Instead they pretty much gave him the keys to the castle. Well in actuality Hitler put
on a mask to hide the evil that was inside him. He portrayed himself as a person who was
completely devoted to Germany. Having been in the military for them in World War 1, and gave
his blood for the country he was very respected by the nation. He was so devoted that he was

shocked when Germany surrendered in World War 1 and was furious when they were forced to
give up parts of their land as part of the treaty. This was the hinge that allowed him to start
getting a political name. He would express his opinions in public places, mainly bars, and
eventually his words would draw crowds. Hitlers most famous speech that he made in a bar was
when he was talking about overthrowing the government. This speech was about why the
government was not doing a good job and he even tried to convince the people to start a
takeover. These words drew guards to the bar though and he was taken to prison for treason. In
prison he really planned out his next move in getting political power and he even wrote Mein
Kompf. He only spent a few months in there however and he immediately got into politics. He
promised the nation big things and the biggest of all was restoring the nation to its formal glory.
With this he started telling people that the German race was the superior race to the world and
with that he started to make the nation racist and it started to hate others. With his smooth words
he was able to persuade an entire nation to the way he thought. What I think was unfortunately
impressive is that he did all this with very little political knowledge. He had an interest in
German politics when he was younger but he never had more than an interest and never did
much research into it. With this political power Hitler became a chancellor in the nation and very
quickly turned that chancellor position into a dictatorship. With his dictatorship he was able to do
whatever he wanted to do with the nation since he had full control of the executive and judicial
branches of the nation. He had full power over the nation which I think is too much power for
one man. However, he did fulfill his promise to the nation and he did restore Germany back to its
former glory. This is where he started to become corrupt though. After restoring the nation Hitler
wanted more. He started invading neighboring countries. He single handedly started World War
2 with his greed. With this he started capturing people and with his power he started the

Holocaust. The Holocaust is one of the greatest tragedies this world has ever faced and to think
that it came from the brain of one man is a chilling thought. I think that Germany should have
tried to over throw him since he was so corrupt but they saw that he fulfilled his promises and
how good of a talker he was and they just silently followed their leader like a row of ducklings
following their mother. (Kershaw, Ian)
The biggest question I had however is why the Jews were mainly targeted in the
holocaust? Well that answer actually came to me very recently actually. During this time there
was already a racial prejudice against the Jews that went around the nation. This information
surprised me because I always thought that the reason why the Jews were the ones who were
targeted is because Hitler hated them for some reason. Instead Hitler used a prejudice that was
already there in order to motivate people into driving them out of the nation. The next question is
why the Holocaust had to kill so many people? The reason the Germans killed so many different
people is because they were trying to make a perfect race. With this perfect race they could make
a Utopia. This is the reasoning Hitler had when he was getting his followers. He convinced
people that there were certain types or races of people in the world that did not deserve to live.
He used his power and speaking skills to convince others what people werent worthy to be a
part of the perfect race. Of these there were the Jews, Poles, handicapped, homosexuals and the
list goes on and on. So the reason why the Jews were included on this is because there was
already a prejudice against them so he used them as the spark to ignite the terrible event. (Wood)
In the end, the Holocaust is a terrible event and it should be studied by all nations as to
why we need to keep such powers in check. Hitler was a wolf in sheeps clothing. He snaked his
way into office and controlled a very powerful nation and with that power he tried to make a
perfect race which meant causing mass genocides of people. Hitler had so much hate it filled a

nation and that nation followed him because of his genius ways of speaking so that others will
trust him.

Resources:
Mrs. Wood presentation from 11/19/14
Adolf Hitler Bio (Author Unknown), biography.com, A&E Television Networks (owner),
http://www.biography.com/people/adolf-hitler-9340144#related-video-gallery
Kershaw, Ian. Hitler. Publisher: New York: W.W. Norton, 1999-2000
Bullock, Allan. Hitler and Stalin: Parallel Lives. Publisher: New York, Random House,
1992
*For my paper the books said the same thing as the website so when I got information
from the website I just marked the website since it would be the easiest to find. I didnt see the
point in giving all three sources since all the information I was using was saying the same thing
from three different books.*