Max Clara and Innsbruck — The origin of a German Nationalist and National Socialist career

This investigation aims to summarize hitherto scattered pieces of evidence of the early biography of Max Clara, especially considering his connections with the Histological Institute of the University of Innsbruck. Max Clara was born in 1899 in South Tyrol, at that time part of the Habsburg Empire. After high school in Bozen and his participation in World War I, Clara studied medicine in Innsbruck, Austria and Leipzig, Germany, graduating from Innsbruck University in 1923. He joined the Corps Gothia, a German Student Corps, at the start of his studies and became socialized as a German nationalist. When the Tyrolean Parliament conducted an illegal referendum in 1921, in which a majority voted for the merger of Tyrol with Germany, the active members of the Gothia spontaneously removed the border barriers between Austria and Bavaria in the municipality of Scharnitz. They brought them to Innsbruck to be deposited in the statehouse. Clara's participation in this activity is not documented but is very likely. Seventy-four per cent of the members of this corps joined the Nazi party (Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei, NSDAP), even before the annexation of Austria by National Socialist (NS) Germany in 1938. Clara likely met Maximinian de Crinis, an SS officer and high-ranking member of the NS health administration, through contacts within their respective corps. De Crinis supported Clara decisively in the anatomist's appointments as chair of anatomy at the University of Leipzig and later at the University of Munich. Initially, Clara began his academic career at the Institute of Histology and Embryology in Innsbruck as (student) demonstrator, and in 1923 as an assistant. In December 1923 Clara had to leave Innsbruck for Blumau, South Tyrol to take over the medical surgery of his father, who had passed away unexpectedly. Back in Italy, he continued his histological research in his spare time and published a large number of scientific papers. His connections with Innsbruck and especially with histologist Jürg Mathis never ceased.