The time after 1900 was the cradle for physical fitness. Especially Germany was pioneering sport as a past time. All kinds of sports clubs and organizations flourished in the years before WWII. The concept of sport and fitness was a major focus area of the leadership of the III.Reich. The Nazi organizations supervised athletics by promoting events and issuing awards for sport achievement. The various civil, political, military and paramilitary organizations promoted or even mandated exercise and sports for their members. To facilitate this, these organizations instituted sport uniforms, which typically included sport shoes, and for warm weather, shorts and a knit tank top with a woven emblem specific to that organization. In cold weather, the sport uniform generally included dark colored knit trousers and a sweatshirt with the sports-specific organizational emblem. The organizational emblem patch used on the sports garments was often a rather large patch, making these appealing souvenirs for Allied troops as they swept into Germany. Some types of the sports patches are very common today, though intact sports clothing is rarer, and some sports emblems for smaller organizations, made in limited numbers, are very rare.

Machine-woven white on dark brown SA patch. It shows the letters "NS" standing for SA-Gruppe Niedersachsen.