IN EARLY JULY 1940 the Utrecht University Students' Union was informed that its clubhouse had to be vacated. The German authorities had decided to use the building as headquarters for the Waffen-SS. The main concern of the students was the stock of spirits. This treasure must not fall into the hands of the Germans! A firm decision was made: on the night of July 8, the entire supply would be drunk and not a single drop of the precious liquor would be left to the enemy. Geert Lubberhuizen was a member of this group. Becoming a student had made him a privileged citizen, a member of the country's future elite, whose worries did not go much beyond the necessary daily quantity of alcohol. In the 1920s, when he joined the editorial staff of the students' journal Vox Studiosorum, he had flirted with fascism. In 1928 he even labeled himself and his fellow members of the Student's Union as “Übermenschen” compared to the common folk. Resistance was far from his mind when the German troops invaded his country; significantly, his imagination did not go much beyond an ordinary drinking bout in protest against the occupation of his clubhouse.

This apolitical attitude, however, was soon to change. The political awareness of the young man who would become the most prominent clandestine book printer was a direct consequence of Germany's anti-Semitic policy. In November 1940 the universities of Delft and Leiden had been shut down after a spontaneous strike in support of Jewish professors. In Utrecht Vox Studiosorum became the center of protest.