Denmark

»Fight for everything you hold dear…« This title is a quotation from a famous Danish song – a symbol of the Danish resistance against the Nazi occupation from 1940 to 1945 – and it served as the headline for the Danish EUSTORY Competition 2014/2015. This year’s award ceremony took place during a historical festival in Copenhagen with more than 10,000 visitors over the weekend. The prize winners were rewarded on the 14th of March 2015 at a public ceremony under the leadership of the Head of Parliament Mogens Lykketoft, who is President of the United Nations General Assembly and since 2014 the new patron of the Danish History Competition.

This year’s winner comes from a small high school in rural Western Jutland. He conducted his research at the local historic archive and found several unpublished documents regarding the foundation of the first farmers’ cooperative dairy in this area around 1880. The farmers’ cooperative movement is an important step in Danish agrarian history which caused the farmers’ emancipation from landlord-dominated production, processing and sales. The winner wrote three short stories which describe the process of new technology and cooperation from the point of view of a farmer, a dairyman and a grocer. His work is based on thorough source studies and it demonstrates great talent as an author. The first prize is awarded with 10,000 Danish crowns.

The second prize was awarded to four students from Randers in Jutland who handed in an impressive film about a young baker, who fought against the German occupation during World War II. Only 21 years old, he got caught and was shot after a short trial. The young researchers worked together with the local historic archive and interviewed the younger brother of the deceased. The outcome is an impressive drama-documentary reconstructing the events that led to the young man’s arrest. He was awarded prize money of 2,000 Danish crowns.

The Danish competition is organised by the Danish History Teachers’ Association and was launched in 2005.