Hitler History

Adolf Hitler was born April 20, 1889. His parents were Austrian-born and his father was 51 at the time of his birth. He had four siblings that died in childhood and only one that survived with him. As a young child, Adolf did well in school and appeared to be on a track to success as an educated person in the early 1900s. However, his father died at age 13, and it wasn't long before Hitler began having trouble in school. His mother allowed him to leave school before he finished, and he eventually moved to Vienna to become an artist.
 
After two failed attempts to gain admission to art school, Hitler kept up his charade that he was going to school in Vienna because he didn't want to disappoint his mother. In the meanwhile, he was living a very bohemian lifestyle, doing odd jobs and selling paintings to get by. The first of his anti-Semitic views are believed to have developed during his time in Vienna. Eventually, he was drafted into the Austrian army, but he didn't want to join because of their 'mixed race' group of soldiers. He managed to fail the physical exam due to 'weakness' and moved to Berlin.
 
Once in Berlin, Hitler decided to volunteer for Germany's army at the start of World War I. His idealization of the German army and government is part of the nationalist ideologies that he picked up in his younger days. He served in World War I, dutifully, and attempted to stay in the army for as long as he could. Once the war was over and an armistice had been reached, Adolf Hitler became even more empowered by his ideals as he felt Germany had stabbed its people in the back by surrendering to the Allied forces.
 
By 1920, Hitler was leading the National Socialist German Workers Party (Nazi Party), as he had re-named it. He used this position to fuel his political agenda based on his beliefs of racial superiority and a totalitarian state of government. By 1933, he had risen to chancellor of Germany. He turned the country into a dictatorship and quickly took control. Although he started small, with discrimination of Jews and other inferiors, Hitler's rule eventually led to the Holocaust, which involved the death of more than 11 million people who were deemed 'inferior' to the Master Race. This spawned World War II, which lasted until 1945 when the Allied powers finally invaded Germany. Adolf Hitler committed suicide on April 30, 1945, shortly after his defeat.