Günter Leifheit, born in 1920, was a successful entrepreneur and manufacturer of household appliances such as clothes airers and carpet sweepers in the early Federal Republic of Germany. It was only relatively late that the public learned that Leifheit, who came from a lower-middle-class background, had volunteered to join the Waffen-SS in 1940 at the age of 20 and had served in the Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler, which was regarded as an elite unit. This chapter of his life, his service on various fronts during the war, and his new beginning after 1945 are examined for the first time on the basis of extensive archival records. The study also asks why the entrepreneur, who was also a patron of the arts, remained silent about his past.
