BACKGROUND: One of the NSDAP’s most ambitious, and successful, projects was the elimination of the overwhelming unemployment suffered in Germany following WWI. To achieve this goal a national labor registration law was enacted on February 26th, 1935, and the "Arbeitsbuch" was instituted, as a record of an individual’s employment history. The Arbeitsbuch underwent three minor modifications during the Third Reich, with the first pattern book issued in 1935, a second pattern in 1939 and a third pattern in 1942. 

PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION: This second pattern, twenty-leaf membership book has, to its 4 1/8" x 5 3/4" brown and grey cardstock cover, "Deutches Reich" above and "Arbeitsbuch" beneath the national eagle and swastika. To the first page, entitled "Arbeitsbuch (Gesetz vom 26. Februar 1935, RGBl. I S.311)," is the book’s number and the individual’s name and signature. The second page, and pages "2a" and "2b" which follow, details the individual’s personal information. The third page, entitled "Berufsausbildung" (Vocational-development), outlines their professional training, and has only a "Keine" (None) ink stamp to it. The fourth page, entitled "Bisherige Beschäftigungsarten von längerer Dauer" (Hitherto Employments of long Duration), lists their work history prior to that recorded in this book, and has a single entry, from "Arbeitsamt Saarbrücken." To the fifth page is the issuing authority’s stamps and signature, dated for July of 1939. The following twenty-four pages chronicle the individual’s work history. Various entries. The last seven pages, to the first of which is the title "Anmerkungen für Arbeitsbuchinhaber und Unternehmer" (Notes for [the] Labor-book-holder and Employer), have thirty points regarding the book’s usage. To the reverse cover is a space for the individual’s signature above "Arbeitsbuch" and the printer’s logo. Nice clean example.

GRADE ****                             PRICE $30.00