Adolf Hitler was appointed chancellor of Germany in 1933 following a series of electoral victories by the Nazi Party. He ruled absolutely until his death by suicide in April 1945. 

The Holocaust was Nazi Germany’s deliberate, organized, state-sponsored persecution and genocide of European Jews. During the war, the Nazi regime and their collaborators systematically murdered over six million Jewish people.

In May 1944, the Western Allies were finally prepared to deliver their greatest blow of the war, the long-delayed, cross-channel invasion of northern France, code-named Overlord.

While thousands of their fellow Americans were about to enter into the Battle of the Bulge and likely face capture under harsh circumstances by the war-weary German enemy, others, already POWs, celebrated a lonely Christmas holiday, the last of the war, in camps across  Europe.
 

Where could a GI enjoy the best big bands, dance with the ladies, and rub elbows with the likes of Marlene Dietrich? Only at the Stage Door Canteen.