Becoming Adolf

Rich Cohen retells a story of how a popular style, the toothbrush mustache, got its notorious reputation from Hitler. He attempts to "defuse" the symbolic and terrifying meaning of the style by growing his own toothbrush mustache, but later decides that it is too powerful and that it still belongs to Hitler even to this day.

Cohen incorporates historic facts like how Hitler's mustache style was introduced to Germany from the United States and that a German folk hero gave it the popularity that may have attributed to Hitler's decision to wear the toothbrush mustache. Cohen grows his own toothbrush mustache to attempt to remove the horrible symbolism for Jews, but he fails.

Rich Cohen learns that some things, no matter how insignificant they may seem, can hold an untold amount of memories. In this case, Hitler (and by association, his mustache) will never be forgotten because of the horror he bestowed upon the Jewish people.