Adolf Hitler was born on April 20, 1889 in Braunau am Inn, Austria. He almost wasn't born Hitler, though--on June 6, 1876 his father changed his name from Schicklgrüber to Hitler to come into a small inheritance. One can only speculate that such a clunky last name would have caused no one to take him seriously. His fraternal grandmother worked for a time in the house of a rich Jewish man and had Hitler’s father out of wedlock, giving rise to rumors--never proven--that Hitler had a Jewish grandfather. His father died when he was 13; his mother when he was 17.
Young Hitler made his way to Vienna, where he was rejected from art school; told upon rejection that he would have more success applying to architectural school, he was nevertheless rejected from that, too, due to the insignificant technicality of his never having completed high school. Thus, he spent some years drifting around the city, selling little paintings to tourists and reading political literature. He drifted to Munich (partly to avoid military service in Austria) on May 24, 1913, and entered the Bavarian army at the advent of WWI, thrilled at the prospect of war.
Hitler spent most of the war running messages, for which he was decorated for bravery. Unfortunately, despite the high mortality rates of message runners, he survived, and after the war became a sort of “political observer” for the German army, looking out for radical left-wing groups who threatened the government and conservative establishment. On Friday, September 13, 1919, Hitler went to a Munich beer hall to hear a meeting of the German Workers’ Party (Deutsche Arbeiter Partei) where he heard a speaker he didn’t like, jumped up and gave a speech, and was promptly invited to join, which he did.
Hitler quickly became the party’s main attraction; he was a highly compelling orator, and they could charge money to hear him speak. He used this status to seize control of the party, throwing out several early founders. Its name was changed to NSDAP (National Socialist German Workers’ Party) in 1920; "Nazi," an abbreviation of National, for short.
By 1923, the Nazis were a fringe group convinced that they were on the rise. Inspired by Mussolini’s march on Rome, Hitler decided to take Germany by force. On the night of November 8, 1923, several Nazis took over a beer hall in Munich where several members of the Bavarian government were meeting. Hitler fired a shot in the air, took captives and forced the leaders to sign documents in support of his new government. They agreed, left, and swiftly called the police. The next morning, Hitler led a couple hundred Nazis and supporters on a march on Berlin, during which they were stopped by a small brigade of Munich cops. Shots were fired, 16 Nazis and 3 policemen died, the Nazis ran, and Hitler wound up in jail. That should have been the end of the story.
At the time, rebellion was severely punished under German law. Left wing agitators were often hanged for distributing revolutionary flyers. Hitler had led an armed revolt which ended with several deaths. However, most of Germany’s judges were leftovers from the old imperial times and quite conservative. Hitler spent most of the trial giving speeches about his plans for Germany’s revival and his hate of the current style of government. His brand of right-wing, nationalistic politics struck a chord with his judges and he was given five years in jail. He in fact only spent 11 months behind bars, spending most of the time dictating his book Mein Kampf (My Struggle) to his loyal sidekick, Rudolph Hess.
What happened next?, you ask. You'll have to go on a tour to find out. Ha! Nothing in this world is free, beloved reader.