Der morgige Tag ist mein

Obviously Cabaret is one of the gayest films ever made. (Lisa Minnelli, for crying out loud!) And this particular scene works much better on the stage. The song 'Tomorrow Belongs to Me' is actually a chilling/thrilling pastiche of the sort of volkische stuff the Hitler Jugend actually used to sing - so much so that when the play first came out in Germany there were former HJs who protested that it brought back bad memories for them of their having been made to sing those very same words as children. More to the point, and especially if you ignore the incongruous way it's sung in this clip (by a dyed-blonde boy with too-even teeth and beauty-spots), it's also hugely charming little lied. In the stage-version its a song that's reprised several times in the first act in between scenes, normally by stage-hands as they move furniture around. It's only at the end of Act I, with the "Fatherland, Fatherland"-verse and the salute, that it becomes clear what the song's really about. Unlike in the film-version, which features the two fey male characters slipping smugly away, on stage it actually makes for an engaging climax to the first half of the play (the second half of which, like the Third Reich itself, sadly doesn't even nearly live up to the promise of its beginning).

The German version is on line here.

The Original Scout Salute

Strange but true!

Actually I think this picture was taken in America, where the salute was virtually the same as the salute ("raised hand", at any rate) for making the Pledge of Allegiance. This old way of doing things I believe pertained in America up until the 1930s, when it suddenly became politically incorrect - for some reason.

Hitler Youth

I've mentioned the Hitler Youth a couple of times with relevance to Scouting here and here. These pics are just a few that I've found on the 'Net. [H/T: Here]

Templar Knights

There's a picture of the controversial German artist Otto Lohmüller with his "Templar Knights" Scout troop here. They look fairly traditional, although if I were being bitchy cynical I might suggest that this could be for aesthetic reasons rather than to do with actual traditional Scouting.

Lohmüller has also written - not to mention illustrated - a number Scouting novels, similar apparently to the French children's books illustrated by Pierre Joubert. One is actually listed on the Riaumont website here. On the cover of one of them, interestingly, he actually uses a cross very similar to the Scouts of Europe cross (a not, despite their name, the Cross of Jerusalem ☩ normally used by the Riaumont and Doran Scouts in France other Catholic Scouts in the same tradition).

Lemonade

Well, I've been in a fairly grim mood recently, and this was too good to use just once. It fits the rubric of this blog just about, and although I don't know whether either of these boys actually is a Scout it is the sort of things that Scouts used to do.

Anon

I found this boy on the 'Net here. I'm guessing either Riaumont or Doran.

The Historical Boys Uniforms site mentions lederhosen.

The HBU site is a good resource clearly, but a lot of the pictures are only accessible to subscribers.

Swiss Scouts

From the PowerBoys blog! (Whatever the rubric at the top of the blog may say, they're definitely not all over 18.) The same blogger I think has more pics from these Scouts' summer camp this year here and here.