The NS documentation centre of the city of cologne is a museum and a research establishment for the history of cologne in times of the national socialism (1933 to 1945).

During the „Lischka-trial“ (1979/1980), due to tips of some residents, the fact that a former Gestapo-prison existed in the EL-DE-House, came to light. On grounds of that, the decision to create the 1981 opened memorial place evolved.

The buildup of a research center, which was led by the historian Horst Matzerath, near the historical archive, also started at the same time. In 1987, the council of cologne decided to build the NS documentation centre, which was located in the EL-DE-House.

As a consequence of the restructuring, the research center was detached from the historical archive and put on an equal footing with the other urban museums on the 25th of March 1997. After the farewell of director Matzerath of the NS-documentation-center, the long-term employee Werner Jung was put into Matzerath’s place on the 5th of December 2002. Since the 1st of February 2003 Karola Fings’s position in the NS documentation center is the one of the assistant director.

The core of the museum is the memorial of the Gestapo-prison located in the basement of the building. Cells of former Gestapo-prisoners, who labelled the walls of the cells, still exist there.

There are two more levels on which the permanent exhibition called „The city of cologne in times of the national socialism“ is shown. Aside from this 1997 opened exhibition, the NS documentation center offers several special exhibitions about local and supra-regional aspects with accompanying events. The museum lists unchanged amounts of visitors. 2002, the number of visitors was 26.000 and in 2011 exceeded to 56.000 visitors. Due to the extensions and modifications of the museum, there were no special exhibitions in 2012.