Valkenburg Open Air Theatre

Valkenburg was ideally placed to receive and accommodate large groups of visitors because of its good tourist infrastructure. One month before the liberation, on 15 August 1944, party leader Mussert visited this town for the last time. The NSB leader gave a speech to about 3,500 supporters in the packed Open Air Theatre in Valkenburg.

The Nazi past never entirely left Valkenburg. Not only because of the relatively large number of NSB and SS members, but also because departments of National Socialist organisations such as the Bund Deutscher Mädel, the Hitlerjugend, and the Weer Afdeling (WA) of the NSB, a Dutch version of the German SA, were located there during the occupation period. A Reichsschule was also established in the former Jesuit monastery. Young (Dutch) pupils at this elite school, which was strongly influenced by the SS, were trained to take up leading positions in the Great Germanic Reich. Around two hundred young people attended classes there until the beginning of September 1944.