COMPLETE NUDITY

Evening Star, Issue 19803, 29 February 1928, Page 5

COMPLETE NUDITY

GYMNASTIC DISPLAY IN BERLIN ANTIDOTE TO UNHEALTHY TENDENCIES “GARDEN OF EDEN” RAIMENT URGED. Press Association -By Telegraph—Copyright BERLIN, February 28. (Received February 29, at 9.15 a.m.) A curious antidote for tlie tendencies revealed in the Kranz case consists of complete nudity. To-day a large invited audience at a Berlin theatre saw men, women, and children, entirely devoid of the smallest particle of clothing, carrying out gymnastic and calisthcnic exercises. The guests included largo numbers of Reichstag deputies and other prominent men and women. The amazing show met with commendation, nor was there an audible protest when the medical adviser to the movement, Dr Hans Graaz, solemnly argued that in the association of men and women “Garden of Eden” raiment was the surest method of mental and physical healthy adding that it would render impossible the atmosphere such as occurred in the Kranz case.

[The case of Kranz, a schoolboy, who was charged with, murdering a boy friend, recalling the Leopold-Locb case in Chicago, caused a sensation in Berlin. It will form a standard document for the historian of social life since the war in Germany, particularly as regards the consequences of the precocity of a youth playing on passions which ho is unable to control. Leading sociologists, doctors, authors, lawyers, and professors were present at the trial, analysing the psychology of the drama. Kranz, who is eighteen years of age, was a scholarship winner, his chief reading since being arrested having been Nietzsche, Schopenhauer, and Dostoievsky. Kranz was visiting the house of a schoolboy friend, Scholler, on the night of the tragedy, others present being a third schoolboy, Stephan, and Scholler’s sister, Hildegard, aged sixteen. The girl’s parents being absent, the boys sat up the night drinking liqueurs and talking of love. The discussion finally turned on death, and Scheller proposed that all four should die. He wrote a letter to the universe, beginning: “Dear Universe, —A single portion of your organism perishes. Don’t worry. Time will roll on.” The letter ended with the intimation that Stephan and Hildegard would be killed, and the others would commit suicide with a smile. Kranz stated that Scheller shot Stephan and committed suicide, and he was about to commit suicide himself when the girl snatched the revolver. Some of the evidence suggested that Stephan, being found in Hilda* gard’s bedroom, precipitated the tragedy. There was also evidence that some of the hoys belonged to a juvenile dub, the statutes of which strictly enjoined that all members who were deceived by men or women friends must avenge themselves upon their rivals. Subsequently the charge was amended to one of manslaughter, on which he was acquitted.]