The Schaffendes Volk exhibition, Düsseldorf 1937

Seen from high under the roof trusses, a dense crowd pushes through a glazed hall between lathes, machines and slogan banners, murals of workers covering the far wall. A demonstrator leans on a polished steel vessel and a heavy machine spins its flywheel; young men in suits study a farm machine lettered Stahl-Kombinus, and display boards headed Leichte Maschinen and Schwere Maschinen show what one or two horses could pull. Visitors pass locomotive wheelsets and a ship's propeller and stand round a fountain with a lighted column of water.

The Reich exhibition Schaffendes Volk ran in Düsseldorf from May to October 1937 and drew millions. It was the showcase of Hermann Göring's Four-Year Plan: German materials, German machines and German farming were to make the country independent of imports and ready for war.