Der Schulungsbrief #6 (1939)
 
Probably the most important and influential of all the party publications produced and printed in Nazi Germany were the monthly issues of an unpretentious 8 x 11-1/2 inch, a well-illustrated monthly magazine called simply Der Schulungsbrief. The magazine tends to be a mystery to most who encounter it.

Most English-speaking collectors, dealers, and historians today incorrectly assume that Der Schulungsbrief was some sort of magazine for schools or school children. Nothing could be further from the truth. The title Der Schulungsbrief actually means and should be translated into English as “The Party Directive”
 
It was published under the direction of the unsung organizational genius of the NSDAP, the Reichsorganisationsleiter himself, Dr. Robert Ley. Ley was the man responsible for all editions of the thick, red, hardcover book Organisationsbuch der NSDAP that was found in EVERY Nazi office and library and was considered a very dangerous Nazi book at the end of World War II and the Allies destroyed every copy they could find! It was the Nazi Party equivalent of “Robert’s Rules of Order” and The Bible. Life in Germany during the Third Reich would have been impossible without either the Organisationsbuch der NSDAP or Der Schulungsbrief.
 
Anybody within the paramilitary structure of the Nazi Party (SA, SS, NSKK, NSFK, DAF, HJ, Auslandsorganisation, etc.) who was in the know had a copy of the Organisationsbuch der NSDAP and subscribed to Der Schulungsbrief magazine. With a monthly circulation of over 4 million, the magazine covered every NSDAP subject from the most serious racial questions to matters like the worldwide geographical distribution of the swastika symbol in antiquity. The extremely anti-Semitic position of Der Schulungsbrief gave away nothing to Julius Streicher’s Der Stürmer.
 
As happened in some cases, Dr. Robert Ley, publisher of Der Schulungsbrief magazine, brought out a special issue to coincide with Reichsparteitag (Nazi Party Day) in Nürnberg. Such issues were good publicity for the magazine as it would be showcased at the annual gathering of the SS, SA, RAD, HJ, and other military and paramilitary formations of the Nazi Party.
 
One Magazine in the German Language for Sale