German Workers' Party

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The German Workers' Party (German: Deutsche Arbeiterpartei, acronym DAP) was the short-lived predecessor of the National Socialist German Workers Party (Nazi Party). It was founded on January 5 1919 by Anton Drexler and Karl Harrer. For most of its existence, the DAP was a tiny group with an unusual combination of contradictory political views and no popular support base.

Adolf Hitler, then a corporal in the German army, was ordered to spy on the DAP in September 1919. He attended a meeting and got into a violent argument with one party member. Following this incident, Anton Drexler was impressed with Hitler's oratory skills and invited him to join the party. After some thinking, Hitler accepted the invitation and joined on October 19 as member number 555 (he was actually only the 55th person to join the DAP; membership numbers began at 500 in order to make the group appear larger). Hitler quickly rose up to become a leading figure in the DAP, becoming the 7th member of its central committee (he would later try to rewrite history and claim that he was "Party Member number 7" to make it look like he was a founder).

Under Hitler's influence, the small number of party members were quickly won over to his views. In an attempt to make the party more broadly appealing to larger segments of the population, the DAP was renamed on February 24 1920 to the "National Socialist German Workers' Party". The name was borrowed from a different Austrian party active at the time (Deutsche Nationalsozialistische Arbeiterpartei).de:Deutsche Arbeiterpartei it:Partito Tedesco dei Lavoratori nl:Duitse Arbeiderspartij no:Det tyske Arbeiderparti sv:Tyska arbetarpartiet