Corner of Karlstraße and Uhlandstraße: Anti-Semitism before 1933

Until the post-war years, Gasthof Ochsen ("Ox Inn") could be found at the location of what is today the Zinser clothing store. During the Weimar Republic, this popular meeting place served as the backdrop for anti-Semitic riots. After Germany's defeat in World War I and the democratic revolution of 1918-19, anti-Semitism continually spread throughout Tübingen.

In January 1923, fraternity students beat up Jewish wood salesman Ludwig Marx in front of Gasthof Ochsen. A few days later students threatened Carl Hugo Dahl, brother-in-law of Jewish publisher Albert Weil. These actions were expressions of the political climate in the university town of Tübingen: a majority of students and professors, parts of the middle class as well as a number of public officials were harboring nationalist, anti-democratic, and anti-Semitic sentiments.

Jewish scholars were almost completely kept out of the university. Prominent professors uttered anti-Jewish statements. Almost all student fraternities had introduced the "Arierparagraph"("Aryan clause"), thereby barring Jews from joining. In 1925, right-wing extremist students tried to violently prevent a talk by Jewish pacifist Emil Julius Gumbel. Pupils from the Uhland-Gymnasium (high school) insulted lawyers Simon and Heinz Hayum; they also threatened Jewish cantor Josef Wochenmark's sons. In 1928, the synagogue was, for the first time, damaged by thrown rocks.

Anti-Semitic political parties and organizations as well as the social milieu of the university were forerunners of National Socialism in Tübingen

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