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Origins and Purpose
The Institute of Sex Research was opened in 1919 by Magnus Hirschfeld and his collaborator Arthur Kronfeld, a once famous psychotherapist and later professor at the Charité. The institute contained rooms dedicated for medical research and treatment, a large library with numerous clinical journals, photographs and documents, and a housing area used by staff, patients, and guests. As well as being a research library and housing a large archive, the Institute also included medical, psychological, and ethnological divisions, and a marriage and sex counseling office. It was visited by around 20,000 people each year, and conducted around 1,800 consultations. Poorer visitors were treated for free. In addition, the institute The Institute advocated for sex education, contraception, the treatment of sexually transmitted diseases, and women's emancipation, as well as being active participants in sexual policy and reform.

'''Despite sexuality itself being a big focus of the institute, it was far from the only topic of research, as it was supplemented with topics such as medicine, biology, psychology, ethnology, and anthropology. In addition to research, the Institute offered marriage and sex counseling, a diagnosis clinic for physical and psychological ailments, and a variety of education programs directed to both the general public and to the continuing education of students or field professionals, which ranged from lectures from esteemed academics to film showings.'''

Foreign Renown
The Institute became a point of scientific and research interest for many scientists of sexuality, as well as scientific, political and social reformers in Germany and Europe, particularly from socialist, liberal and social-democratic circles. In 1923 the Institute was visited by Nikolai Semashko, Commissar for Health in the Soviet Union. This was followed by numerous visits and research trips by health officials, political, sexual and social reformers, and scientific researchers from the Soviet Union interested in the work of Hirschfeld. In 1926 a delegation from the institute, led by Hirschfeld, reciprocated with a research visit to Moscow. In 1929 Hirschfeld presided over the third international congress of the World League for Sexual Reform at Wigmore Hall.

Sexology and Transexualism
Magnus Hirschfeld coined the term transsexualism, identifying the clinical category which his colleague Harry Benjamin would later develop in the United States. He also cofounded the field of sexology with contributions so notable that Sigmund Freud publicly acknowledged their importance. Transgender people were on the staff of the Institute, as well as being among the clients there. Various endocrinologic and surgical services were offered, including the first modern sex reassignment surgeries in the 1930s.

Treatment
'''Hirschfeld developed a therapy method for LGBT patients named adaptation therapy, which consisted of encouraging patients to live "according to their nature" and socialize with other individuals with the same sexual or gender identity. This approach was highly controversial in the psychiatric field.'''

Sex Reassignment Surgeries
'''The Institute performed the first modern sex reassignment surgery on Dorchen "Dora" Richter in 1931, under the supervision of Hirshfeld. Ritcher had identified as female since early childhood, and had previously attempted to remove her male genitals. She was chemically castrated in 1922, and continued to present as female and live in the Institute doing domestic work. The success of this operation caused sex reassignment surgery to increase in popularity, with the Institute becoming one of the main authorities on the topic.'''

'''In order to obtain surgery, individuals needed the approval of a physician before undergoing surgery (often Hirschfeld's) a practice which is still in place today, as transgender individuals are required to be screened by a psychiatrist prior to any transition surgeries. This is done in order to determine if they will or will not benefit from such treatment. Hirchsfeld's recommendations of surgery were considered definitive, and carried so much weight that he was once able to make the German government pay for the sex reassignment surgery of a male to female patient.'''

Political Work
Hirschfeld also worked with Berlin's police department to curtail the arrest of cross-dressed individuals, including those suspected of wearing certain clothing in connection with sex work, through the creation of transvestite passes issued on behalf of the Institute to those who had a personal desire to wear clothing associated with a gender other than the one assigned to them at birth. Although this wasn't explicitely illegal, cross-dressed individuals were often arrested under public disturbance charges.

'''For much of its history, the Institute worked to repeal Paragraph 175, which made sexual relationships between two males illegal. This included the presentation of a signed petition to remove the penal code, which contained the signatures of several prominent scientific, political, artistic, or otherwise intellectual figures, such as Albert Einstein. The code was revised and redrafted under Justice Minister Radbruch to decriminalize all consensual sexual behavior between two members of the same gender, with the exception of prostitution and sex with minors. This revision was ultimately discarded as the Nazi party increased in popularity and political power.'''

Other notable political work included a petition for the Prussian Law to be amended, in order to allow intersex individuals to choose their sex at 18 instead of forcing doctors to decide during early childhood, as well as constant campaigns for sexual freedom and other legal reforms.

Nazi Era
In late February 1933, as the influence of Ernst Röhm weakened, the Nazi Party launched its purge of gay (then known as homophile) clubs in Berlin, outlawed sex publications, and banned organised gay groups. As a consequence, many fled Germany (including, for instance, Erika Mann). In March 1933 the Institute's main administrator, Kurt Hiller, was sent to a concentration camp. The buildings were later taken over by the Nazis for their own purposes. They were a bombed-out ruin by 1944, and were demolished sometime in the mid-1950s. Hirschfeld tried, in vain, to re-establish his Institute in Paris, but he died in France in 1935.

On 6 May 1933, while Hirschfeld was in Ascona, Switzerland, the Deutsche Studentenschaft made an organised attack on the Institute of Sex Research. A few days later, the Institute's library and archives were publicly hauled out and burned in the streets of the Opernplatz. Between 12,000 to 20,000 books and journals, and even larger number of images and sex subjects, were destroyed. Also seized were the Institute's extensive lists of names and addresses. In the midst of the burning, Joseph Goebbels gave a political speech to a crowd of around 40,000 people. The leaders of the Deutsche Studentenschaft also proclaimed their own Feuersprüche (fire decrees). Also books by Jewish writers, and pacifists such as Erich Maria Remarque, were removed from local public libraries and the Humboldt University, and were burned.

'''Ludwig L. Lenz, a gynecologist who worked at the Institute before fleeing during the Nazi regime, stated that numerous members of the Nazi party had been treated at the Institute for various reasons, including sexual deviation. Lenz speculated that this is the main reason behind the destruction of all documents and studies left in the Institute.'''

While many fled into exile, the radical activist Adolf Brand made a stand in Germany for five months after the book burnings, but in November 1933 he had given up gay activism. On 28 June 1934 Hitler conducted a purge of gay men in the ranks of the SA wing of the Nazis, which involved murdering them in the Night of the Long Knives. This was then followed by stricter laws on homosexuality and the round-up of gay men. The address lists seized from the Institute are believed to have aided Hitler in these actions. Many tens of thousands of arrestees found themselves, ultimately, in slave-labour or death camps. Karl Giese committed suicide in 1938 when the Germans invaded Czechoslovakia and his heir, lawyer Karl Fein, was murdered in 1942 during deportation.