A key element in the Nazi triumph was the generation of schoolteachers who matured in the last decade of the nineteenth century, were infected with Völkisch anti-Semitism, and had become senior teachers by the 1920s.107 The textbooks they used reflected the same influences. The university academics similarly contributed to the rise of Nazi influence by preaching national salvation through panaceas and ‘spiritual revivals’, instead of sceptical empiricism.
