This radio was developed by engineer Otto Griessing (1897 -1958), and the Bakelite cabinet was designed by Walter Maria Kersting (1889 – 1970), the Professor of Artistic and Technical Design at the Cologne School of Design.

The Volksempfänger (People’s receiver) radio was produced under a program initiated by German Minister for Propaganda Joseph Goebbels. Radio was a relatively new medium and radio receivers were prohibitively expensive at the time. Goebbels realised radio’s potential to deliver Adolf Hitler’s powerful oratories and the ability to control the reception and broadcast of information.

His brief to engineer Griessing was to design and mass produce an affordable radio receiver for German citizens. From 1933 to 1939 over nine million radio receivers were manufactured. They were built jointly by 28 manufacturers including AEG, Braun, Blaupunkt, Eumig, Loewe, Lorenz, Philips, Siemens and Telefunken among others. The Volksempfänger illustrates what a powerful tool radio was, and still is, to both inform and influence the community. The number 301 in the model’s title is a reference to 30 January 1933, the day after Hitler seized power in Germany.

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