The Literary Digest

Articles from The Literary Digest

Early Aviation Safety Inventions (The Literary Digest, 1912)

An overview of the technological advancements that had been introduced in the aviation community in 1912. References are made to the superiority of the Pneumatic Flying Helmet, and the installation of the W. I. Twombly Safety Harness, oil gauges, self-acting gas pumps, double-cables, self-starting motors and heavily re-enforced wheels.

References are also made to the 1910, twenty-two mile flight across the English Channel by a pilot named Bleriot.

Captain Eddy Rickenbacker: Ace of Aces (The Literary Digest, 1919)

This is a wonderful read in which the American World War One fighter pilot Eddie Rickenbacker (1890 – 1973), recounted his experiences in the skies above France.

I learned pretty fast. Long practice in driving a racing-car at a hundred miles an hour or so gives first-class training in control and judging distances at high speed…

His Route to Paris (Literary Digest, 1927)

Attached is a 1927 illustration depicting that broad expanse that separates the continents of Europe and North America and presents for the viewer the various transatlantic routes chosen not only by Charles Lindbergh but other pilots as well.

The 1930s March to the Pews (Literary Digest, 1933)

…since the Depression began one out of every six banks has failed, one out of every forty-five hospitals has closed, one out of every twenty-two business and industrial concerns has become bankrupt…


– for those living in the digital age, the quote posted above is simply another mildly interesting, stale line from American history – but when those words were written in 1932 it meant for those who read it that there world was falling apart. So much of what they were taught to believe in was collapsing before their very eyes and as a result they felt a need to know God – and know Him they did; half way through 1932 churches and other religious bodies showed a total net gain of 929,252 members thirteen years of age or over – one of the largest gains ever recorded – and the total membership, thirteen years or more of age, reached the record figure of 50,037,209.


Click here to read about the American South during the Great Depression.

Foreign Artists Barred from Germany (Literary Digest, 1933)

Shortly after Adolf Hitler took charge in Germany, a law was passed that forbid the hiring of foreign artists, composers, writers and performers. As the attached article clarifies, there were exceptions, but all concerned recognized that it was a new day in Germany but not necessarily a better one. Writing for the New York-based magazine, MODERN MUSIC, German arts critic Hans Heinsheimer (1900 – 1993) wrote:

The aim of the National Socialist is to push us back into the Middle Ages. Their politico-culture demands are radical… They set us up as the German Superman against the ‘inferior foreigners.’

Food Shortages in the Third Reich (Literary Digest, 1937)

Guns instead of butter! was the slogan General Hermann Goering, Commissar, sounded for the Four Year Plan destined to control production and slash imports as an aid to the Reich’s fantastic rearmament program.

For the great mass of Germans, however, the most serious food shortage since the war cast a pall over Christmas. Housewives got orders to specify their favorite dairy store, and to patronize it exclusively. By prohibiting any shopping around, officials found it possible to limit the distribution of butter and other fats. A census of of the size of families has already been taken, and, beginning January 1, every housewife must limit fat purchases to at least 80 per cent of her October buying.

Food Shortages in the Third Reich (Literary Digest, 1937)

Guns instead of butter! was the slogan General Hermann Goering, Commissar, sounded for the Four Year Plan destined to control production and slash imports as an aid to the Reich’s fantastic rearmament program.

For the great mass of Germans, however, the most serious food shortage since the war cast a pall over Christmas. Housewives got orders to specify their favorite dairy store, and to patronize it exclusively. By prohibiting any shopping around, officials found it possible to limit the distribution of butter and other fats. A census of of the size of families has already been taken, and, beginning January 1, every housewife must limit fat purchases to at least 80 per cent of her October buying.

The Fascist Mojo in Germany (Literary Digest, 1933)

Shortly after that infamous day when Hitler was sworn into power in the offices of Paul Von Hindenburg, this article hit the newsstands in North America about the new mood that was creeping across Germany:

At no time since the war – not even during the occupation of the Ruhr – it is said, has there been so much militarist and nationalist propaganda in Germany as there is now.

Anti-militarist newspapers, it appears, are afraid, in Berlin at least, to raise their voice in protest because of the continual and ruinous suspensions by the authorities…


During the summer of 1938 the Nazis allowed one of their photo journalists out of the Fatherland to wander the American roads; This is what he saw…

Gregor Strasser: the Nazi Rebel (Literary Digest, 1933)

Attached is a profile of Hitler’s director of the NSDAP (National Socialist German Workers’ Party), and their political differences that led to his resignation.

Hitler was hard hit when Gregor Strasserstyle=border:none
(1892 – 1934), one of his ablest and oldest supporters, broke away from him. It happened in one of the fights between rival factions in the Hitlerite movement which followed losses sustained in the November Reichstag elections.

Profound gratitude is due Strasser from Hitler because when Hitler was released from jail, there was at least a nucleus of his party left, so that its reconstruction did not have to begin in a void. Gratitude was expressed on Hitler’s part for he made Strasser chief of his propaganda work.

He was murdered in his prison cell during the Night of Long Knives (June 30, 1934).

Read about the German POWs who were schooled in virtues of democracy.

The Murder of SA Stormtrooper Herbert Hentsch (Literary Digest, 1933)

The Nazis were very adept at eating their young; here is but one of many stories from assorted German and Austrian newspapers that illustrated that point:

The Hitlerites, it alleges, have their own Army, police, and courts functioning independently of the constituted authorities, even defying those authorities, and passing death sentences by secret tribunals.

In Dresden dwelt a ‘shock-troop division’ man named Herbert Hentsch whose body was found not so long ago.

Various circumstances suggest that comrades of the dead young man within the Nazi ranks put him out of the way…


CLICK HERE to read about the beautiful Blonde Battalions who spied for the Nazis…