Exhibition “80 Years After the End of the War – Fire Debris from World War II”

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In the midst of the pandemic, in the fall of 2021, the Library History Collection of the LMU Munich University Library was enriched by a truly unique sub-collection: a collection of fire debris from World War II.

As a member of the crew operating an anti-aircraft gun in the English Garden, Ulrich Paret (1905–1993) experienced the air raids on Munich in March 1943 at close quarters and, after a bombing raid, collected some singed items from the University Library but still legible remnants of pages from rare books from the rubble of the university library, which he carefully filed away in notebooks and kept in his house in Friedrichshafen on Lake Constance for decades after the end of the war. There he worked as a high school teacher of history, Latin, and Greek, conducted local history research, and was involved for many years as a volunteer city archivist; in 1989, he was awarded the Medal of Honor of the City of Friedrichshafen.

His son Friedhelm Paret, who lives in Bayreuth, bequeathed this extraordinary private collection to the University Library of LMU Munich; upon review, it was discovered that it also included remnants from the holdings of the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek in Munich, which had also been severely damaged by the bombing raid on March 10, 1943.

Date and location of the exhibition

• Duration of the exhibition: July 2, 2025 – January 9, 2026
• Location: University Library, Foyer Lernzentrum Geschwister-Scholl-Platz (2nd floor), Geschwister-Scholl-Platz 1, 80539 München

Contact

Dr. Sven Kuttner
University Library of LMU Munich
Deputy director
Special Collections Department
E-mail: sven.kuttner@ub.uni-muenchen.de