Fritz Kuhn's Nazi America: Kuhn's Growth and Destruction of the German American Bund in the 1930s

This thesis was submitted to the Department of History of the University of Kansas in partial fulfillment of the requirements for departmental honors.The German American Bund was the most influential and dangerous American Nazi organization to exist before the destruction of Hitler’s Germany. Building itself from the remnants of two Nazi organizations that failed to establish any kind of true legitimacy, the Bund saw an explosion of its’ prestige due to their leader: Fritz Kuhn. This paper will argue that no other group established themselves to the same degree, as a legitimate Nazi Organization within American culture as the German American Bund. Conversely as the perception of the Bund within society grew as a legitimate threat to democracy as Hitler’s army moved throughout Europe, the social conditions within the United States during the 1930s exacerbated the attraction to the Bund and inflamed the desire of the government to see the Bund’s demise. It is vitally important to understanding how Nazism, and political dissidence gains attraction and support as there has been a resurgence of pro-Nazi activity within culture today