On October 16, 1906, the shoemaker Wilhelm Voigt put on a captain’s uniform and took command of a group of soldiers in Berlin. He occupied the town hall of Köpenick, arrested the mayor and took the town treasury. The Berliner Volks-Zeitung commented: Umkleide dich in Preußen-Deutschland mit einer Uniform, und du bist allmächtig. Put on a uniform in Prussian Germany, and you are all-powerful. The story made German Untertanengeist, the spirit of the obedient subject, a joke around the world. Carl Zuckmayer turned it into a play, which premiered at the Deutsches Theater Berlin on March 5, 1931. Heinrich Mann gave the same type a name in his novel Der Untertan, finished in 1914. Kurt Tucholsky described its hero in two phrases. He beugt sich nach oben, bows to those above, and he tritt nach unten, kicks those below.