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The German character not only craves size, but loves neatness. The 1,500,000 Germans who rally at Nürnberg each year could not possibly be housed or hold their mass festivities in the town itself (normal pop. 450,000). As a result, in the past five years a titanic Parteitag Geldnde, or party grounds, has been in the process of construction, in what used to be Nürnberg's Luitpold Park (see map). The area is larger than that of the old walled town.
Not content with just one big stadium for outdoor shows and one big hall for indoor shows, the Nazis will have no less than five stadia and four halls—a place for everything—when they get through building in 1943. Not yet completed are the Exhibition Hall, the Kultur Hall, the Nazi Congress Hall, the March Field where an army corps will be able to maneuver, or the New Stadium for party sports. But Nazis do pretty well with what is already up.
Most of the visitors are sheltered in camps pitched within a ten-mile radius, the fun-spot being the semipermanent Kraft durch Freude (Strength through Joy) camp midway between the old town and the party grounds. Every night up to 100,000 Nazis who are to perform before the Fuhrer on the morrow are bedded in barracks at the Party Camp adjoining the broad Lake Dutzend and buildings. Pending the completion of super-colossal March Field, Adolf Hitler this week had to be content with the Zeppelin Meadow, holding 100,000 spectators. And pending the completion of the Nazi Congress Hall, world's largest (40,000 seats). Orator Hitler was to speak to 10,000 sitters and 20,000 standees in Luitpold Hall. Also on schedule was the annual early morning service for the Party dead in the Luitpold Arena, a Youth Rally in the Old Stadium. A Labor Service drill of 45,000. a search-lit demonstration of 110,000 political leaders and all-day war games would wear down the grass of the Zeppelin Meadow. Hitler writes but a henchman reads the Fuhrer's annual opening Proclamation at Nürnberg. Millions of Europeans hoped he would end the suspense over Czechoslovakia one way or the other by revealing his intentions in this proclamation. But Der Fuhrer had a whole week of speech-making to his Nazis before him. and the Proclamation only heightened the world's suspense by saying, with reference to Germany's self-sufficiency, "the idea of a blockade of Germany already may be abandoned as a totally ineffectual weapon.''