Sign for the Oskar Stäbel House

The sign bearing the inscription “Comradeship House of Karlsruhe Students and the National Socialist German Student League, Oskar Stäbel House” presumably dates from 1934. It was probably affixed to what is now known as Franz Schnabel House on KIT’s South Campus. Originally constructed in 1857 as a breeding station for the Grand Ducal pheasant garden and as a residence for the pheasant hunter, the building was repurposed after the Nazis assumed power. It was allocated to the National Socialist German Student League (NSDStB) intended to accommodate students at low cost with full board and barracks-style bunk beds similar to in the Reich Labour Service (Reichsarbeitsdienst), it reflected a militarized daily routine according to Nazi principles. This arrangement was part of the broader aim to bring private areas of life under state control, particularly within the university sector. The National Socialists sought to disrupt existing independent student structures by using the house as a base for the leaders of so-called comradeships, essentially student fraternities restructured along totalitarian lines. This comradeship house was inaugurated in June 1934 and named after Oskar Stäbel (1901–1977), who was a prominent leader of the NSDStB and the German Student Union. Apart from studying mechanical engineering and writing his thesis at Karlsruhe Polytechnic, he rose rapidly in the NSDAP party and in the SA. Stäbel’s term as Reichsführer of the NSDStB was cut short by the Röhm Coup a few weeks after the building’s opening. In such circumstances its official name couldn’t be kept. Following World War II, the building was renovated and initially served as the Carl Engler and Hans Bunte Institute of Mineral Oil and Coal Research. By the late 1980s, it housed institutes from the Department of Humanities and Social Sciences. In 1992, it was renamed in honor of the historian Franz Schnabel (1887–1966), who had been persecuted by the Nazis. kn