From the second half of the 1920s, large housing projects were realised to alleviate the greatest need of the many Innsbruck residents who lived in barracks or with relatives in cramped conditions. Entire new neighbourhoods were built with kindergartens and schools. Sports and leisure centres such as the Tivoli and the municipal indoor swimming pool were built. One of the master builders who made lasting changes to Innsbruck during this period was Theodor Prachensky (1888 - 1970).

As an employee of the Innsbruck building authority between 1913 and 1953, he was responsible for housing and infrastructure projects. The projects he realised are not as spectacular as the mountain stations of his brother-in-law Baumann. Prachensky's buildings, which have stood the test of time, often appear sober and purely functional. However, if you look at his drawings in the Archives of Architecture at the University of Innsbruck, you realise that Prachensky was more of an artist than a technician, as his paintings also prove. Many of his spectacular designs, such as the Sozialdemokratische Volkshaus in der Salurnerstraße, sein Kaiserschützendenkmal oder die Friedens- und Heldenkirche were not realised. Innsbruck is home to the large housing estates of the 1920s and 30s, the Warrior Memorial Chapel at the Pradl cemetery and the old labour office (Note: today a branch of the University of Innsbruck behind the current AMS building in Wilten) many of Prachensky's buildings, which document the contemporary history of the interwar period and the changing political and state influences under which he himself was influenced.

His biography reads like an outline of Austrian history in the early 20th century. Prachensky worked as an architect and civil servant under five different state models. The Austro-Hungarian monarchy was followed by the First Republic, which was replaced by the authoritarian corporative state. In 1938, the country was annexed by Nazi Germany. The Second Republic was proclaimed at the end of the war in 1945.

In 1908, Prachensky graduated from the construction department of the Gewerbeschule Innsbruck, now the HTL. From 1909, he worked partly together with Franz Baumann, whose sister Maria he was to marry in 1913, at the renowned architectural firm Musch & Lun in Merano, at that time also still part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. In his private life, 1913 was a groundbreaking year for him: Theodor and Maria got married and started the private construction project for their own home Haus Prachensky at Berg Isel Weg 20 and the new family man started work at the Innsbruck City Council under Chief Building Officer Jakob Albert. Instead of having to work his way through the difficult economic situation in the private sector after the war, Prachensky worked in the public sector. The important projects influenced by social democratic ideas could only be started after the first and most difficult post-war years, characterised by inflation and supply shortages. The first was the Schlachthausblock im Saggen zwischen 1922 und 1925. Es folgten mehrere Infrastrukturprojekte wie der Mandelsbergerblock, der Pembaurblock and the kindergarten and secondary school in Pembaurstraße, which were primarily intended for the socially disadvantaged and the working class affected by the war and the post-war period. The labour office designed in 1931 was also an important innovation in the social welfare system. Since the founding of the republic in 1918, the labour office helped to place jobseekers with employers and curb unemployment.

His importance increased again during the economic crisis of the 1930s. Another turning point in Prachensky's career was the next change in Austria's form of government. Despite the shift to the right under Dollfuß, including the banning of the Social Democratic Party in 1933 and the Anschluss in 1938, he was able to remain in the civil service as a senior civil servant. Together with Jakob Albert, Prachensky realised the housing blocks known as the South Tyrolean Settlements under the National Socialists from 1939. Unlike several members of his family, he himself was never a member or supporter of the NSDAP.

His father Josef Prachensky, who went down in Tyrolean history as one of the founders of social democracy, probably had a great influence on his work as an architect and urban planner in line with international social democratically orientated architecture.

In addition to his father's political views, the disappearance of the Habsburg monarchy and his impressions of military service in the First World War also had an influence on Prachensky. Although he said he was against the war, he volunteered for military service in 1915 as a one-year volunteer with the Tyrolean Kaiserjäger. Perhaps it was the expectations placed on him as a civil servant during the war, perhaps the general enthusiasm that prompted him to take this step, the statements and the deed are contradictory. The war memorial chapel at the Pradl cemetery and the Kaiserschützenkapelle on Tummelplatz, which he designed together with Clemens Holzmeister, as well as his unrealised designs for a Kaiserjäger monument and the Friedens- und Heldenkirche Innsbruckare probably products of Prachensky's life experience.

After the Second World War, he remained active for a further eight years as Chief Planning Officer for the city of Innsbruck. In addition to his work as a construction planner and architect, Prachensky was a keen painter. He died in Innsbruck at the age of 82. His sons, grandsons and great-grandsons continued his creative legacy as architects, designers, photographers and painters in various disciplines. In 2017, parts of the cross-generational work of the Prachensky family of artists were exhibited in the former brewery Adambräu mit einer Ausstellung gezeigt.

Few eras are more difficult to grasp than the interwar period. The Roaring TwentiesJazz and automobiles come to mind, as do inflation and the economic crisis. In big cities like Berlin, young ladies behaved as Flappers with a bobbed head, cigarette and short skirts, lascivious to the new sounds, Innsbruck's population, as part of the young Republic of Austria, belonged for the most part to the faction of poverty, economic crisis and political polarisation.

Although the Republic of German-Austria had been proclaimed, it was unclear how things would continue in Austria. The new Austria seemed too small and not viable. The monarchy and nobility were banned. The bureaucratic state of the k.u.k. Empire seamlessly asserted itself under a new flag and name. The federal states, as successors to the old crown lands, were given a great deal of room for manoeuvre in legislation and administration within the framework of federalism. However, enthusiasm for the new state was limited among the population. Not only was the supply situation miserable after the loss of the vast majority of the former Habsburg empire, people mistrusted the basic idea of the republic. The monarchy had not been perfect, but only very few people could relate to the idea of democracy. Instead of being subjects of the emperor, they were now citizens, but only citizens of a dwarf state with an oversized capital that was little loved in the provinces instead of a large empire. In the former crown lands, most of which were governed by Christian socialists, people liked to speak of the Viennese water headwho was fed by the yields of the industrious rural population.

Other federal states also toyed with the idea of seceding from the Republic after the plan to join Germany, which was supported by all parties, was prohibited by the victorious powers of the First World War. The Tyrolean plans, however, were particularly spectacular. From a neutral Alpine state with other federal states, a free state consisting of Tyrol and Bavaria or from Kufstein to Salurn, an annexation to Switzerland and even a Catholic church state under papal leadership, there were many ideas. The most obvious solution was particularly popular. In Tyrol, feeling German was nothing new. So why not align oneself politically with the big brother in the north? This desire was particularly pronounced among urban elites and students. The annexation to Germany was approved by 98% in a vote in Tyrol, but never materialised.

Instead of becoming part of Germany, they were subject to the unloved Wallschen. Italian troops occupied Innsbruck for almost two years after the end of the war. At the peace negotiations in Paris, the Brenner Pass was declared the new border. The historic Tyrol was divided in two. The military was stationed at the Brenner Pass to secure a border that had never existed before and was perceived as unnatural and unjust. In 1924, the Innsbruck municipal council decided to name squares and streets around the main railway station after South Tyrolean towns. Bozner Platz, Brixnerstrasse and Salurnerstrasse still bear their names today. Many people on both sides of the Brenner felt betrayed. Although the war was far from won, they did not see themselves as losers to Italy. Hatred of Italians reached its peak in the interwar period, even if the occupying troops were emphatically lenient. A passage from the short story collection "The front above the peaks" by the National Socialist author Karl Springenschmid from the 1930s reflects the general mood:

"The young girl says, 'Becoming Italian would be the worst thing.

Old Tappeiner just nods and grumbles: "I know it myself and we all know it: becoming a whale would be the worst thing."

Trouble also loomed in domestic politics. The revolution in Russia and the ensuing civil war with millions of deaths, expropriation and a complete reversal of the system cast its long shadow all the way to Austria. The prospect of Soviet conditions made people afraid. Austria was deeply divided. Capital and provinces, city and countryside, citizens, workers and farmers - in the vacuum of the first post-war years, each group wanted to shape the future according to their own ideas. The divide was not only on a political level. Morality, family, leisure activities, education, faith, understanding of the law - every area of life was affected. Who should rule? How should wealth, rights and duties be distributed? A communist coup was not a real danger, especially in Tyrol, but could be easily instrumentalised in the media as a threat to discredit social democracy. In 1919, a workers', peasants' and soldiers' council modelled on the Soviet model was formed in Innsbruck, but its influence remained limited and was not supported by any party. The soldiers' councils officially formed from 1920 onwards were dominated by Christian socialists. The peasant and middle-class camp to the right of centre subsequently militarised with the Tiroler Heimatwehr more professionally and in greater numbers than left-wing groups. Nevertheless, social democracy was criticised from church pulpits and in the conservative media as Jewish Party and homeless traitors to their country. They were all too readily blamed for the lost war and its consequences. The Tiroler Anzeiger summarised the people's fears in a nutshell: "Woe to the Christian people if the Jews=Socialists win the elections!".

While in the rural districts the Tyrolean People's Party as a merger of Farmers' Union, People's Association und Catholic Labour Despite the strong headwinds in Innsbruck, the Social Democrats under the leadership of Martin Rapoldi were able to win between 30 and 50% of the vote in the first elections in 1919. The fact that it did not work out for the comrades with the mayor's seat was due to the majorities in the municipal council through alliances of the other parties. Liberals and Tyrolean People's Party was at least as hostile to social democracy as he was to the federal capital Vienna and the Italian occupiers.

But high politics was only the framework of the actual misery. The as Spanish flu This epidemic, which has gone down in history, also took its toll in Innsbruck in the years following the war. Exact figures were not recorded, but the number of deaths worldwide is estimated at 27 - 50 million. Many Innsbruck residents had not returned home from the battlefields and were missing as fathers, husbands and labourers. Many of those who had made it back were wounded and scarred by the horrors of war. As late as February 1920, the "Tyrolean Committee of the Siberians" at the Gasthof Breinößl "...in favour of the fund for the repatriation of our prisoners of war..." organised a charity evening. Long after the war, the province of Tyrol still needed help from abroad to feed the population. Under the heading "Significant expansion of the American children's aid programme in Tyrol" was published on 9 April 1921 in the Innsbrucker Nachrichten to read: "Taking into account the needs of the province of Tyrol, the American representatives for Austria have most generously increased the daily number of meals to 18,000 portions.“

Then there was unemployment. Civil servants and public sector employees in particular had lost their jobs after the League of Nations tied its loan to harsh austerity measures. Tourism as an economic factor was non-existent due to the problems in the neighbouring countries, which were also shaken by the war. Urban planning was also faced with big questions. What was to be done with public buildings such as barracks, castles and palaces? Very little happened in the first few years. It was only with the currency restructuring and the introduction of the schilling as the new currency in 1925 under Chancellor Ignaz Seipel that Innsbruck slowly began to recover and was able to initiate the modernisation of the city. Major projects such as the Tivoli, the municipal indoor swimming pool, the high road to the Hungerburg, the mountain railways to Mount Isel and the Nordkette, new schools and apartment blocks could only be built after the first post-war problems had been overcome. The signature of the new, large mass parties in the design of these projects cannot be overlooked.

The first republic was a difficult birth from the remnants of the former monarchy and it was not to last long. Despite the post-war problems, however, a lot of positive things also happened in the First Republic. Subjects became citizens. What began in the time of Maria Theresa was now continued under new auspices. The change from subject to citizen was characterised not only by a new right to vote, but above all by the increased care of the state. State regulations, schools, kindergartens, labour offices, hospitals and municipal housing estates replaced the benevolence of wealthy citizens, the monarchy and the church. Times were hard and the new system had not yet been honed.

To this day, much of the Austrian state and Innsbruck's cityscape and infrastructure are based on what emerged after the collapse of the monarchy. In Innsbruck, there are no conscious memorials to the emergence of the First Republic in Austria. The listed residential complexes such as the Slaughterhouse blockthe Pembaurblock or the Mandelsbergerblock oder die Pembaur School are contemporary witnesses turned to stone.

In addition to hunger, political polarisation characterised people's lives in the 1920s and 1930s. Although the collapse of the monarchy had brought about a republic, the two major popular parties, the Social Democrats and the Christian Socials, were as hostile to each other as two scorpions. Both parties set up paramilitary blocs to back up their political agenda with violence on the streets if necessary. The Republican Defence League on the side of the Social Democrats and various Christian-social or even monarchist-orientated Home defenceFor the sake of simplicity, the different groups will be summarised under this collective term, were like civil war parties. Many politicians and functionaries on both sides had fought at the front during the war and were correspondingly militarised. The Tiroler Heimatwehr was able to rely on better infrastructure and a political network in rural Tyrol thanks to the support of the Catholic Church. On 12 November 1928, the tenth anniversary of the founding of the Republic, 18,000 members of the Austrian armed forces marched through the city on the First All-Austrian Homeland March to underline their superiority on the highest holiday of the domestic social democracies. The Styrian troops were quartered in Wilten Abbey, among other places.  

From 1930, the NSDAP also became increasingly present in the public sphere. It was able to gain supporters, particularly among students and young, disillusioned workers. By 1932, the party already had 2,500 members in Innsbruck. There were repeated violent clashes between the opposing political groups. The so-called Höttinger Saalschlacht Hötting was not yet part of Innsbruck at that time. The community was mainly inhabited by labourers. In this red National Socialists planned a rally in the Tyrolean bastion at the Gasthof Golden Beara meeting place for the Social Democrats. This provocation ended in a fight that resulted in over 30 people being injured and one death from a stab wound on the National Socialist side. The riots spread throughout the city, with the injured even clashing in the hospital. Only with the help of the gendarmerie and the army was it possible to separate the opponents.

After years of civil war-like conditions, the Christian Socialists under Chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss (1892 - 1934) prevailed in 1933 and eliminated parliament. There was no fighting in Innsbruck. On 15 March, the party house of the Tyrolean Social Democratic Workers' Party in the Hotel Sonne The Republican Protection League leader Gustav Kuprian was arrested for high treason and the individual groups disarmed. Dollfuß's goal was to establish the so-called Austrian corporative statea one-party state without opposition, curtailing elementary rights such as freedom of the press and freedom of assembly. In Tyrol in 1933, the Tiroler Wochenzeitung was newly founded to function as a party organ. The entire state apparatus was to be organised along the lines of Mussolini's fascism in Italy under the Vaterländischen Front united: Anti-socialist, authoritarian, conservative in its view of society, anti-democratic, anti-Semitic and militarised.

Dollfuß was extremely popular in Tyrol, as pictures of the packed square in front of the Hofburg during one of his speeches in 1933 show. His policies were the closest thing to the Habsburg monarchy. His political course was supported by the Catholic Church. This gave him access to infrastructure, press organs and front organisations. Against the hated socialists, the Patriotic Front with their paramilitary units. The press was politically controlled and censored. The articles glorified the idyllic rural life. Families with many children were supported financially. The segregation of the sexes in schools and the reorganisation of the curriculum for girls, combined with pre-military training for boys, was also in the interests of a large part of the population. The unspoken long-term goal was the restoration of the monarchy. In 1931, a number of Tyrolean mayors joined forces to have the entry ban for the Habsburgs lifted.

On 25 July 1934, the banned National Socialists attempted a coup in Vienna, in which Dollfuß was killed. There was also an attempted coup in Innsbruck. A policeman was shot dead in Herrengasse when a group of National Socialists attempted to take control of the city. Hitler, who had not ordered the attacks, distanced himself, and the Austrian groups of the banned party were restricted as a result. In Innsbruck, the "Verfügung des Regierungskommissärs der Landeshauptstadt Tirols“ der Platz vor dem Tiroler Landestheater als Dollfußplatz led. Dollfuß had met with the Tyrolean Heimwehr leader Richard Steidle at a rally here two weeks before his death.

Dollfuß' successor as Chancellor Kurt Schuschnigg (1897 - 1977) was a Tyrolean by birth and a member of the Innsbruck student fraternity Austria. He ran a law firm in Innsbruck for a long time. In 1930, he founded a paramilitary unit called Ostmärkische Sturmscharenwhich formed the counterweight of the Christian Socials to the radical Heimwehr groups. After the February Uprising in 1934, as Minister of Justice in the Dollfuß cabinet, he was jointly responsible for the execution of several Social Democrats.

However, Austrofascism was unable to turn the tide in the 1930s, especially economically. The economic crisis, which also hit Austria in 1931 and fuelled the radical, populist policies of the NSDAP, hit hard. State investment in major infrastructure projects came to a standstill. The unemployment rate in 1933 was 25%. The restriction of social welfare, which was introduced at the beginning of the First Republick was introduced had dramatic effects. The long-term unemployed were excluded from receiving social benefits as "Discontinued" excluded.

The housing situation was a particular problem. Despite the city's efforts to create modern living space, many Innsbruck residents still lived in shacks. Bathrooms or one bedroom per person were the exception. Since the great growth of Innsbruck from the 1880s onwards, the housing situation was precarious for many people. The railways, industrialisation, refugees from the German-speaking regions of Italy and the economic crisis had pushed Innsbruck to the brink of the possible. After Vienna, Innsbruck had the second highest number of residents per house. Rents for housing were so high that workers often slept in stages in order to share the costs. Although new blocks of flats and homeless shelters were built, especially in Pradl, such as the workers' hostel in Amthorstraße in 1907, the hostel in Hunoldstraße and the Pembaurblock, this was not enough to deal with the situation. Out of this need and despair, several shanty towns and settlements were created on the outskirts of the city, founded by the marginalised, the desperate and those left behind who found no place in the system.

In the prisoner-of-war camp in the Höttinger Au, people were quartered in the barracks after being mustered out. The best known and most notorious to this day was the Bocksiedlung on the site of today's Reichenau. From 1930, several families settled in barracks and caravans between the airport, which was located there at the time, and the barracks of the Reichenau concentration camp. The legend of its origins speaks of Otto and Josefa Rauth as the founders, whose caravan was stranded here. Rauth was not only economically poor, but also morally poor as an avowed communist in Tyrolean terms. His raft, Noah's Ark, with which he wanted to reach the Soviet Union via the Inn and Danube, was anchored in front of Gasthof Sandwirt.

Gradually, an area emerged on the edge of both the town and society, which was run by the unofficial mayor of the estate, Johann Bock (1900 - 1975), like an independent commune. He regulated the agendas in his sphere of influence in a rough and ready manner.

The Bockala had a terrible reputation among the good citizens of the city. And despite all the historical smoothing and nostalgia, probably not without good reason. As helpful and supportive as the often eccentric residents of the neighbourhood could be, physical violence and petty crime were the order of the day. Excessive alcohol consumption was common practice and the streets were unpaved. There was no running water, sewage system or sanitary facilities, nor was there a regular electricity supply. Even the supply of drinking water was precarious for a long time, which brought with it the constant risk of epidemics.

Many, but not all, of the residents were unemployed or criminals. In many cases, it was people who had fallen through the system who settled in the Bocksiedlung. Having the wrong party membership could be enough to prevent you from getting a flat in Innsbruck in the 1930s. Karl Jaworak, who carried out an assassination attempt on Federal Chancellor Prelate Ignaz Seipel in 1924, lived at Reichenau 5a from 1958 after his imprisonment and deportation to a concentration camp during the Nazi regime.

The furnishings of the Bocksiedlung dwellings were just as heterogeneous as the inhabitants. There were caravans and circus wagons, wooden barracks, corrugated iron huts, brick and concrete houses. The Bocksiedlung also had no fixed boundaries. Bockala In Innsbruck, being a citizen was a social status that largely originated in the imagination of the population.

Within the settlement, the houses and carriages built were rented out and sold. With the toleration of the city of Innsbruck, inherited values were created. The residents cultivated self-sufficient gardens and kept livestock, and dogs and cats were also on the menu in meagre times.

The air raids of the Second World War exacerbated the housing situation in Innsbruck and left the Bocksiedlung grow. At its peak, there are said to have been around 50 accommodations. The barracks of the Reichenau concentration camp were also used as sleeping quarters after the last imprisoned National Socialists held there were transferred or released, although the concentration camp was not part of the Bocksiedlung in the narrower sense.

The beginning of the end was the 1964 Olympic Games and a fire in the settlement a year earlier. Malicious tongues claim that this was set to speed up the eviction. In 1967, Mayor Alois Lugger and Johann Bock negotiated the next steps and compensation from the municipality for the eviction, reportedly in an alcohol-fuelled atmosphere. In 1976, the last quarters were evacuated due to hygienic deficiencies.

Many former residents of the Bocksiedlung were relocated to municipal flats in Pradl, the Reichenau and in the O-Village quartered here. The customs of the Bocksiedlung lived on for a number of years, which accounts for the poor reputation of the urban apartment blocks in these neighbourhoods to this day.

A reappraisal of what many historians call the Austrofascism has hardly ever happened in Austria. In the church of St Jakob im Defereggen in East Tyrol or in the parish church of Fritzens, for example, pictures of Dollfuß as the protector of the Catholic Church can still be seen, more or less without comment. In many respects, the legacy of the divided situation of the interwar period extends to the present day. To this day, there are red and black motorists' clubs, sports associations, rescue organisations and alpine associations whose roots go back to this period.

The history of the Bocksiedlung was compiled in many interviews and painstaking detail work by the city archives for the book "Bocksiedlung. A piece of Innsbruck" of the city archive.

In the 1920s and 30s, the NSDAP also grew and prospered in Tyrol. The first local branch of the NSDAP in Innsbruck was founded in 1923. With "Der Nationalsozialist - Combat Gazette for Tyrol and Vorarlberg" published its own weekly newspaper. In 1933, the NSDAP also experienced a meteoric rise in Innsbruck. The general dissatisfaction and disenchantment with politics among the citizens and theatrically staged torchlight processions through the city, including swastika-shaped bonfires on the Nordkette mountain range during the election campaign, helped the party to make huge gains. Over 1800 Innsbruck residents were members of the SA, which had its headquarters at Bürgerstraße 10. While the National Socialists were only able to win 2.8% of the vote in their first municipal council election in 1921, this figure had already risen to 41% by the 1933 elections. Nine mandataries, including the later mayor Egon Denz and the Gauleiter of Tyrol Franz Hofer, were elected to the municipal council. It was not only Hitler's election as Reich Chancellor in Germany, but also campaigns and manifestations in Innsbruck that helped the party, which had been banned in Austria since 1934, to achieve this result. As everywhere else, it was mainly young people in Innsbruck who were enthusiastic about National Socialism. They were attracted by the new, the clearing away of old hierarchies and structures such as the Catholic Church, the upheaval and the unprecedented style. National Socialism was particularly popular among the big German-minded lads in the student fraternities and often also among professors.

When the annexation of Austria to Germany took place in March 1938, civil war-like scenes ensued. Already in the run-up to the invasion, there had been repeated marches and rallies by the National Socialists after the ban on the party had been lifted. Even before Federal Chancellor Schuschnigg gave his last speech to the people before handing over power to the National Socialists with the words "God bless Austria" had closed on 11 March 1938, the National Socialists were already gathering in the city centre to celebrate the invasion of the German troops. The police of the corporative state were partly sympathetic to the riots of the organised manifestations and partly powerless in the face of the goings-on. Although the Landhaus and Maria-Theresien-Straße were cordoned off and secured with machine-gun posts, there was no question of any crackdown by the executive. "One people - one empire - one leader" echoed through the city. The threat of the German military and the deployment of SA troops dispelled the last doubts. More and more of the enthusiastic population joined in. At the Tiroler Landhaus, then still in Maria-Theresienstraße, and at the provisional headquarters of the National Socialists in the Gasthaus Old Innspruggthe swastika flag was hoisted.

On 12 March, the people of Innsbruck gave the German military a frenetic welcome. To ensure hospitality towards the National Socialists, Mayor Egon Denz had each worker paid a week's wages. On 5 April, Adolf Hitler personally visited Innsbruck to be celebrated by the crowd. Archive photos show a euphoric crowd awaiting the Führer, the promise of salvation. Mountain fires in the shape of swastikas were lit on the Nordkette. The referendum on 10 April resulted in a vote of over 99% in favour of Austria's annexation to Germany. After the economic hardship of the interwar period, the economic crisis and the governments under Dollfuß and Schuschnigg, people were tired and wanted change. What kind of change was initially less important than the change itself. "Showing them up there", that was Hitler's promise. The Wehrmacht and industry offered young people a perspective, even those who had little to do with the ideology of National Socialism in and of itself. The fact that there were repeated outbreaks of violence was not unusual for the interwar period in Austria anyway. Unlike today, democracy was not something that anyone could have got used to in the short period between the monarchy in 1918 and the elimination of parliament under Dollfuß in 1933, which was characterised by political extremes. There is no need to abolish something that does not actually exist in the minds of the population.

Tyrol and Vorarlberg were combined into a Reichsgau with Innsbruck as its capital. There was no armed resistance, as the left in Tyrol was not strong enough. There were isolated instances of unorganised subversive behaviour by the Catholic population, especially in some rural communities around Innsbruck. Even though National Socialism was viewed sceptically by a large part of the population, there was hardly any organised resistance. The apparatus of power dominated people's everyday lives too comprehensively. Many jobs and other comforts of life were tied to an at least outwardly loyal attitude to the party. The majority of the population was spared imprisonment, but the fear of it was omnipresent.

The regime under Hofer and Gestapo chief Werner Hilliges also did a great job of suppression. In Tyrol, the church was the biggest obstacle. During National Socialism, the Catholic Church was systematically combated. Catholic schools were converted, youth organisations and associations were banned, monasteries were closed, religious education was abolished and a church tax was introduced. Particularly stubborn priests such as Otto Neururer were sent to concentration camps. Local politicians such as the later Innsbruck mayors Anton Melzer and Franz Greiter also had to flee or were arrested. To summarise the violence and crimes committed against the Jewish population, the clergy, political suspects, civilians and prisoners of war would go beyond the scope of this book.

The Gestapo headquarters were located at Herrengasse 1, where suspects were severely abused and sometimes beaten to death with fists. In 1941, the Reichenau labour camp was set up in Rossau near the Innsbruck building yard. Suspects of all kinds were kept here for forced labour in shabby barracks. Over 130 people died in this camp consisting of 20 barracks due to illness, the poor conditions, labour accidents or executions.

Prisoners were also forced to work at the Messerschmitt factory in the village of Kematen, 10 kilometres from Innsbruck. These included political prisoners, Russian prisoners of war and Jews. The forced labour included, among other things, the construction of the South Tyrolean settlements in the final phase or the tunnels to protect against air raids in the south of Innsbruck. In the Innsbruck clinic, disabled people and those deemed unacceptable by the system, such as homosexuals, were forcibly sterilised.

The memorials to the National Socialist era are few and far between. The Tiroler Landhaus with the Liberation Monument and the building of the Old University are the two most striking memorials. The forecourt of the university and a small column at the southern entrance to the hospital were also designed to commemorate what was probably the darkest chapter in Austria's history.

Like the course of the city's history, its appearance is also subject to constant change. The years around 1500 and between 1850 and 1900, when political, economic and social changes took place at a particularly rapid pace, produced particularly visible changes in the cityscape. However, the most drastic event with the greatest impact on the cityscape was probably the air raids on the city during the Second World War.

In addition to the food shortage, people suffered from what the National Socialists called the "Heimatfront" in the city were particularly affected by the Allied air raids. Innsbruck was an important supply station for supplies on the Italian front.

The first Allied air raid on the ill-prepared city took place on the night of 15-16 December 1943. 269 people fell victim to the bombs, 500 were injured and more than 1500 were left homeless. Over 300 buildings, mainly in Wilten and the city centre, were destroyed and damaged. On Monday 18 December, the following were found in the Innsbrucker Nachrichten, dem Vorgänger der Tiroler Tageszeitung, auf der Titelseite allerhand propagandistische Meldungen vom erfolgreichen und heroischen Abwehrkampf der Deutschen Wehrmacht an allen Fronten gegenüber dem Bündnis aus Anglo-Amerikanern und dem Russen, nicht aber vom Bombenangriff auf Innsbruck.

Bombenterror über Innsbruck

Innsbruck, 17. Dez. Der 16. Dezember wird in der Geschichte Innsbrucks als der Tag vermerkt bleiben, an dem der Luftterror der Anglo-Amerikaner die Gauhauptstadt mit der ganzen Schwere dieser gemeinen und brutalen Kampfweise, die man nicht mehr Kriegführung nennen kann, getroffen hat. In mehreren Wellen flogen feindliche Kampfverbände die Stadt an und richteten ihre Angriffe mit zahlreichen Spreng- und Brandbomben gegen die Wohngebiete. Schwerste Schäden an Wohngebäuden, an Krankenhäusern und anderen Gemeinschaftseinrichtungen waren das traurige, alle bisherigen Schäden übersteigende Ergebnis dieses verbrecherischen Überfalles, der über zahlreiche Familien unserer Stadt schwerste Leiden und empfindliche Belastung der Lebensführung, das bittere Los der Vernichtung liebgewordenen Besitzes, der Zerstörung von Heim und Herd und der Heimatlosigkeit gebracht hat. Grenzenloser Haß und das glühende Verlangen diese unmenschliche Untat mit schonungsloser Schärfe zu vergelten, sind die einzige Empfindung, die außer der Auseinandersetzung mit den eigenen und den Gemeinschaftssorgen alle Gemüter bewegt. Wir alle blicken voll Vertrauen auf unsere Soldaten und erwarten mit Zuversicht den Tag, an dem der Führer den Befehl geben wird, ihre geballte Kraft mit neuen Waffen gegen den Feind im Westen einzusetzen, der durch seinen Mord- und Brandterror gegen Wehrlose neuerdings bewiesen hat, daß er sich von den asiatischen Bestien im Osten durch nichts unterscheidet – es wäre denn durch größere Feigheit. Die Luftschutzeinrichtungen der Stadt haben sich ebenso bewährt, wie die Luftschutzdisziplin der Bevölkerung. Bis zur Stunde sind 26 Gefallene gemeldet, deren Zahl sich aller Voraussicht nach nicht wesentlich erhöhen dürfte. Die Hilfsmaßnahmen haben unter Führung der Partei und tatkräftigen Mitarbeit der Wehrmacht sofort und wirkungsvoll eingesetzt.

This news item, which was imaginatively designed by censorship and media synchronisation, barely made it onto page 3. There was probably no more prominent way of presenting the city's poor preparation for the foreseeable bombardment to the public. The enthusiasm for National Socialism was no longer quite as great as in 1938 after the Anschluss, when Hitler was enthusiastically welcomed by 100,000 people in Innsbruck on 5 April. The damage to the city and the personal, tragic losses among the population were too great. In January 1944, the construction of air-raid tunnels and other protective measures began. The work was largely carried out by prisoners from the Reichenau concentration camp.

Innsbruck was attacked a total of twenty-two times between 1943 and 1945. Almost 3833, i.e. almost 50%, of the city's buildings were damaged and 504 people died. In the final months of the war, normality was out of the question. The population lived in constant fear. Schools were closed in the mornings. A regular everyday life was no longer conceivable.

Fortunately, the city was only the victim of targeted attacks. German cities such as Hamburg and Dresden were completely razed to the ground by the Allies with firestorms that claimed tens of thousands of lives within a few hours. Many buildings such as the Jesuit Church, Wilten Abbey, the Servite Church, the cathedral and the indoor swimming pool in Amraserstraße were hit.

Historic buildings and monuments received special treatment during the attacks. The Goldene Dachl was protected with a special construction, as was Maximilian's sarcophagus in the Hofkirche. The figures in the Hofkirche, the Schwarzen Mannderwere brought to Kundl. The Mother of Mercy, the famous picture from Innsbruck Cathedral, was transferred to Ötztal during the war.

The air-raid shelter tunnel south of Innsbruck on Brennerstrasse and the markings of houses with air-raid shelters with their black squares and white circles and arrows can still be seen today. In Pradl, where next to Wilten most of the buildings were damaged, bronze plaques on the affected houses indicate that they were hit by a bomb.