page_title: Ernst Heinkel
section_title: 1933-1945
hierarchical_section_title: Ernst Heinkel / 1933-1945
context_page_description: Dr. Ernst Heinkel was a German aircraft designer, manufacturer, Wehrwirtschaftsführer in the Third Reich, and member of the Nazi party. His company Heinkel Flugzeugwerke produced the Heinkel He 178, the world's first turbojet aircraft and jet plane, and the Heinkel He 176, the first rocket aircraft.
context_section_description: After Adolf Hitler came to power, designs by Heinkel's firm formed a vital part of the Luftwaffe's growing strength in the years leading up to the Second World War. This included the Heinkel He 59, the Heinkel He 115 and the Heinkel He 111. He was designated a Wehrwirtschaftführer (~ defence industry leader) by the German government for his commitment to rearmament.
  Heinkel was passionate about high-speed flight, and was keen on exploring alternative forms of aircraft propulsion. He donated aircraft to Wernher von Braun who was investigating rocket propulsion for aircraft, as well as sponsoring the research of Hans von Ohain into turbojet engines, leading to the flight of the Heinkel He 178, the first aircraft to fly solely under turbojet power by Erich Warsitz on August 27, 1939.
  Heinkel had been a critic of Hitler's regime concerning being forced to fire Jewish designers and staff in 1933, however, he was a member of the Nazi party, awarded the German National Prize for Art and Science in 1938, one of the rarest honors of the German government, and he used forced Jewish labor starting in 1941, in which his company was considered a "model for slave labor."
  In 1942 the government "nationalised" the Heinkel works. In practice, this meant that Heinkel was detained until he sold his controlling interest in his factories to Hermann Göring. Heinkel moved to Vienna and started a new design bureau and corporate offices in Vienna's Schwechat suburb, establishing manufacturing facilities in Zwölfaxing and Floridsdorf as the Heinkel-Sud complex for his firm, the original Rostock-"Marienhe" plant (today's Rostock-Schmarl neighborhood) becoming the Heinkel-Nord facility.  It was at the Heinkel-Sud offices that Dr. Heinkel worked on the Heinkel He 274 four-engined high-altitude heavy bomber design - as one of the trio of proposals for aircraft designs to succeed his firm's failed Heinkel He 177A heavy bomber — until the war ended.
caption: Heinkel 111P dropping bombs over Poland, September 1939
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