Konrad Kujau
Konrad Kujau - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Konrad Kujau. Konrad Paul Kujau (June 27, 1938, Löbau, Saxony - September 12, 2000, Stuttgart, ... Kujau's early life was of unremitting poverty and his mother ...
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Konrad Kujai
Konrad Kujau, left, presents the faked Hitler Diaries in a ... On a wall in Konrad Kujau's house there used to hang a handwritten letter from Adolf Hitler. ...
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Konrad Kujau | Scam Types dot Com
As his greed and ambition grew so did his forgeries. ... Despite this, Konrad Kujau excelled at school, though finances forced him to ...
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Konrad Kujau - Telegraph
KONRAD KUJAU, who has died aged 62, admitted in 1983 to forging the ... Fischer", it turned out, was Konrad Kujau, the manager of a rather unsuccessful ...
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The Hitler Diaries, a notorious case of forgery - Crime Library on ...
Konrad Kujau, an admirer of Adolph Hitler, forged a number of Hitler documents and letters, but his most outrageous forgery was 27 volumes of a diary that allegedly ...
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Fake Konrad Kujau Fakes (Comments)
A reference guide to hoaxes, pranks, practical jokes, frauds, tricks, and other ... Konrad Kujau was the forger responsible for creating the Hitler Diaries. ...
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The Hitler Diaries
The Hitler Diaries, a hoax perpetrated on Stern magazine and others by the forger Konrad Kujau ... Fischer" was actually Konrad Kujau, who'd managed to make a ...
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Konrad Kujau 2000 Deaths - Infoplease.com
Biography > Noteworthy People > Deaths > 2000 Deaths > G - L. Konrad Kujau. Age: 62 ... More on Konrad Kujau from Infoplease: ...
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Forger Konrad Kujau in 1990 -- Courant.com
"The Hitler Diaries," 1983 ... Konrad Kujau, in photo, in partnership with Gerd Heidemann, forged the book. Most viewed photos ...
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Konrad Paul Kujau (June 27, 1938, Löbau, Saxony - September 12, 2000, Stuttgart, Germany) was an artist and forger who became famous in 1983 as the creator of the so-called Hitler Diaries, for which he received 9.3 million German mark from the magazine Stern (magazine).
"Konny" Kujau was one of five children of Richard Kujau, a cobbler, who died in 1944. Kujau's early life was of unremitting poverty and his mother was obliged to send her children into orphanages for periods of time. Konrad did well at school, but was obliged to leave at 16 and was apprenticed to a locksmith. After a year he quit and took a succession of casual jobs. In 1957 a warrant was issued for his arrest over the theft of a microphone from the Löbau Youth Club, where he was then working. Kujau left German Democratic Republic and fled to West Berlin to stay with his uncle.
Kujau eventually settled in Stuttgart where he drifted into a life of casual work and petty crime. In 1961, after several arrests and two short jail terms for theft, Kujau met and settled down with Edith Lieblang. They opened a bar, but the next year he was arrested for forging Luncheon Voucher under the name "Peter Fischer" and spent five days in prison. Kujau and Leibling then started an office cleaning business which eventually prospered. Incidentally, a "Dr. Fischer" was originally named as the source of the Hitler Diaries.
In the early 1970's Kujau began to illegally import Nazi militaria from East Germany. In order to increase their value Kujau began to forge documents to give them false provenance. He also began to forge paintings - something that had been a mere hobby until then - signing them "Adolf Hitler". Kujau became more ambitious as he realised the potential market for Nazi memorabilia. He copied out Hitler's published Mein Kampf and sold it as "the original manuscript". To an old pistol he attached a label claiming that it was the gun with which Hitler committed suicide. He was aided by the fact that most "collectors" of Nazi items were highly secretive, since possession of these items was illegal under German law.
In 1978 he sold his first "Hitler Diary" to a collector. In 1980 he was contacted by the journalist Gerd Heidemann who had learned of the diary. Kujau told Heidemann that the diaries were in the possession of his brother, who was a General in the East German army. Heinemann made a deal with Kujau for the "the rest" of the diaries.
Over the next two years Kujau faked a further 61 volumes and sold them to Heinemann for 2.5 million DM. Heidemann in turn received 9 million DM from his employers at the magazine "Stern".
However on their publication in 1983 the diaries were soon proven to be fakes and Heidemann and Kujau were arrested. In August 1984 Kujau was sentenced to 4½ years for forgery and Lieblang one year as an accomplice. Heinemann was convicted of fraud and received a sentence of 4 years 8 months.
On his release from prison after 3 years Kujau became something of a minor celebrity appearing on TV as an "forgery expert", and set up a business selling "genuine Kujau fakes" in the style of various major artists. He stood for election as Mayor of Stuttgart in 1996, receiving over 900 votes. Kujau died of cancer in 2000.
In a further ironic development, in 2006 his grand-niece, Petra Kujau, was charged with selling "fake forgeries", cheap Asian-made copies of famous paintings with forged signatures of Konrad Kujau.
Sources
- Robert Harris (novelist): Selling Hitler (Faber & Faber, 1986) ISBN 0-571-14726-7
Weblinks
- Kujau Archive