NS Documentation Centre

For many years, Mannheim's City Archive has made it its task to remember National Socialism and its victims. With the NS Documentation Centre, the MARCHIVUM fulfils this task with a fresh approach.

This is done quite deliberately in a building from the National Socialist era. The MARCHIVUM is located in a former World War II bunker. The history of the building illustrates the inclusion and exclusion mechanisms of the National Socialist "Volksgemeinschaft". The bunker, in which the "Volksgenossen" found protection from the Allied air raids, had to be built by forced labourers and prisoners of war, most of whom had no access to the air raid shelters.

On the 1st floor of the former bunker, the NS Documentation Centre is located on an area of about 600 square metres. The largest part of this area is taken up by the exhibition "Why should I care?" on the history of National Socialism in Mannheim. In addition, there is a room with research stations where visitors can explore the biographies of victims and perpetrators of the Nazi dictatorship.

A seminar room for school classes and other interested groups is also available. Another room tells the story of the bunker from its creation during the war to the post-war period, when it was first used to replace lost living space and was later upgraded to a nuclear bunker as a result of the Cold War.