Adolf Hitler was a German politician who was the leader of the Nazi Party, Chancellor of Germany from 1933 to 1945 and Fuhrer of Nazi Germany from 1934 to 1945. As dictator, Hitler initiated World War II in Europe with the invasion of Poland in September 1939, and was central to the Holocaust. Take a look below for 30 more interesting and bizarre facts about Adolf Hitler.

1. Hitler was born in Austria, then part of Austria-Hungary, and was raised near Linz.

2. He moved to Germany in 1913 and was decorated during his service in the German Army in World War I.

3. In 1919, he joined the German Workers’ Party, the precursors of the NSDAP, which would become the Nazi Party, and was appointed leader of the NSDAP in 1921.

4. In 1923, the attempted to seize power in a failed coup in Munich and was imprisoned. While in jail, he dictated the first volume of his autobiography and political manifesto Mein Kampf.

5. After his release from prison in 1924, Hitler gained popular support by attacking the Treaty of Versailles and promoting Pan-Germanism, anti-Semitism and anti-Communism with charismatic oratory and Nazi propaganda.

6. He frequently denounced international capitalism and communism as being part of a Jewish conspiracy.

7. He practices his speeches by having photos taking of himself in various poses.

8. Hitler never once visited a single concentration camp during the war.

9. He regularly used cocaine during the war years.

10. Hitler was obsessed with his teenage niece, making her a virtual prisoner in his home and perhaps his lover. She died in a suspicious “suicide” with Hitler’s gun the same day that they argued about her trying to flee to Vienna.

11. Before his father changed it, the family name was Schicklgruber.

12. He sed to receive injections of bull semen to enhance his sexual virility.

13. There’s no evidence to support the popular theory that his father’s family was Jewish, but family DNA does contain elements common among Jews and Africans.

14. Before he adopted his signature mustache, he had a handlebar mustache but had to trim it before joining the army.

15. Records show that he suffered from a host of maladies, including irritable bowel syndrome and Parkinson’s disease.

16. The skull recovered by the Soviets in 2000, that was believed to have been Adolf Hitler’s was tested in 2009 and was confirmed to be of a woman in her 30s.

17. Hitler often praised the “efficiency” of the American Genocide of Native Americans.

18. After Jesse Owens won 4 gold medals in the 1936 Olympics held in Berlin, Hitler sent Owens a commemorative inscribed cabinet photograph of himself. Honors were not bestowed upon Jesse Owners by either President Franklin D. Roosevelt or his successor Harry S. Truman during their terms.

19. When coming in power in January 1933, the Nazi Party passed a comprehensive set of animal protection laws, with Hitler saying, “In the new Reich, no more animal cruelty will be allowed.”

20. The French Resistance cut the elevator cables to the Eiffel Tower to keep Hitler from visiting it during his visit when Paris fell. When faced with the prospect of climbing over 1500 stairs, he opted out.

21. Hitler orchestrated what was the most powerful anti-smoking movement in the world during the 1930s and early 1940s.

22. Nearly all profits from Hitler’s Mein Kampf, his image and his artwork go to charity. Bavaria owns the rights and sometimes has difficulty finding a charity to accept them, as they are widely considered “blood money.”

23. One of Hitler’s personal chauffeurs and close friends was found to be Jewish and was targeted for expulsion from the SS by Heinrich Himmler. Upon hearing that Maurice was of Jewish descent, Hitler made an exception for Maurice and his brothers calling them “honorary Aryans.”

24. He was the first European leader to ban the operation of human zoos.

25. Hitler became incredibly paranoid after a food poisoning attempt that he had a staff of 15 terrified young women taste test all of his meals.

26. After a few rogue Nazi officers almost succeeded in killing him in 1944, he had 5,000 people executed in response.

27. After a total war economy was instituted in 1943, Hitler had the women’s cosmetics industry gradually closed down rather than banned outright to avoid upsetting Eva Braun.

28. Hitler planned to collect thousands of Jewish artifacts to build the “Museum of An Extinct Race.”

29. To foster infighting and maximize power, Hitler used to intentionally give contradicting orders to officers whose duties he knew would overlap.

30. Hitler wrote a second book after Mein Kampf in 1928. In it, he describes why he would go to war in Europe and how he admired U.S. eugenics programs. It was never published because he feared it would hurt the already low Mein Kampf sales.