In 1944, Nazi officials decided to shelter critical factories in massive underground tunnels. This project will be the first to detail the history of the underground dispersal and relocation projects. This study will look at businesses, government, and local relationships through traditional archive research and web technology; discover the effectiveness of the tunnel projects; and learn why only some projects are memorialized.
This is the companion site to my dissertation for the PhD in Modern European History at George Mason University. I’ll be posting information about the dissertation writing process, the research, and the analysis and results in the form of a blog. This is contains a digital version of the prospectus presented to the History PhD Colloquium in December 2010.
Dissertation Committee:
Advisor – Mills Kelly, GMU (European History: Modern East Central Europe, 1989 as a global phenomenon, historical pedagogy, human trafficking)
Reader – Marion Deshmukh, GMU (European History: European cultural history, history of modern Germany and Austria, German and Austrian art history)
Reader – Steve Barnes, GMU (European History: Modern Russian and Soviet History, Totalitarianism, Cold War Europe)
Hi, I have looked at your site here and wondered if you could help me out.
I belong to an obscure group called MIAG (Military Industrial Archealogly Group)
Which is a small group who research mainly military sites. We are currantly looking at the CIOS reports on the underground factories that were built during WW2 and we are finding that some of the sites or any infor mation is hard to come by.
Would you consider sharing some of your findings/information?
kind regards
S Quinton MIAG
Hi Steve,
Thanks for leaving a note. I am definitely willing to share the information I have. That is one of the big parts of my dissertation research, is to see how opening up my materials benefits other researches and the interested public. I also did not come up with much information about the underground factories during my initial search, which is why I chose it for my dissertation project. My goal is to upload all of the documents that I find (copyright allowing) to this site so they are available to anyone. So check back often.
A good place to look for information is the Goudsmit Collection at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C. The National Archives in College Park, MD also have micro film copies of many Nazi documents. They hold a bit of information, but it is kind of scattered. They have some decent finding tools here: http://www.archives.gov/research/captured-german-records/foreign-records-seized.html#virginia
I’m hoping to get a scholarship or two to do some research in Germany next school year, so that I can search the archives in Germany, and document and locate as many of the tunnel sites as possible.
There are also a plethora of sites and other people looking into similar things. I’ll have to add a page of resources soon…
Theres tunnels at karhla and muhldorf in germany but most on in the polish sectors
Hi there,
I just found your site through a Google search. In your methodology presentation, you take Elie Barioz as an example. He was my great grandfather, and until I found your site, I had no idea what had become of him, neither did any of my family members.
Thank you,
Agnes,
I’m so very glad to hear that the website helped you find information about your great grandfather! Such interactions truly made all of the work worth it.
Ammon