Reichstag

Construction of the building began only well after 1871. Previously, the parliament had assembled in several other buildings in the Leipziger Straße in Berlin; but these were generally considered too small, so in 1872 an architectural contest with 103 participating architects was carried out to erect an all-new building. Work did not start until ten years later though, due to various problems with purchasing property for the new building and arguments between Wilhelm I, Otto von Bismarck, and the members of the Reichstag about how the construction should be performed.

In 1882, another architectural contest was held, with 189 architects participating. This time the winner, the Frankfurt architect Paul Wallot, would actually have his plan executed. On 9 June 1884, the foundation stone was finally laid by Wilhelm I. Before construction was completed in 1894, Wilhelm I died (in 1888, the Year of Three Emperors). His successor, Wilhelm II, objected to parliament as an institution to a much greater extent. The original building was most acclaimed for the construction of an original cupola of steel and glass, an engineering masterpiece of the time.

After World War I had ended and the Kaiser had abdicated, during the revolutionary days of 1918, Philipp Scheidemann proclaimed the institution of a republic from one of the balconies of the Reichstag building on 9 November. The building continued to be the seat of the parliament of the Weimar Republic (1919-1933), which was still called Reichstag.

Adress: Friederichsst 11311h714l rasse S bahn 1,2,3,5,7,9 Friedrichstrasse 1,2 Unter den Linden

52°31'7.27"N

13°22'31.95"E

Berlin Television Tower

... always on top

Soar to an altitude of 200 metres in only 40 seconds! Experience fascination and hospitality in the heart of Berlin. You will be enchanted by this special round trip.

Visit us to enjoy the amazing, boundless view and dine at our fine restaurant. The restaurant's floor spins around its own axis twice every hour, so that you can take pleasure in a delicious meal and in the spectacular view of Berlin at the same time. Have a refreshing drink at our bar on the indoor observation deck. Our food and drinks are unforgettable!

Our service team looks forward to serving you during your visit. Perhaps you would like to celebrate your wedding in lofty heights? We provide the location and service for all of your festivities. For further information please contact us.

Generally

Adress:

Berliner Fernsehturm

Panoramastr. 1A

D-10178 Berlin

Postdamer Platz

Tiergarten

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Location of the Tiergarten neighborhood

View within the Tiergarten

Tiergarten (German for Animal Garden) is the name of both a large park in Berlin and a neighborhood within the borough of Mitte. Before German reunification, the borough of Tiergarten was a part of West Berlin. Before Berlin's 2001 administrative reform, Tiergarten was also the name of a borough, consisting of the current neighborhood of Tiergarten (formerly called Tiergarten-Süd) plus Hansaviertel and Moabit. A new system of road and rail tunnels running under the park is located in the neighborhood, and Berlin's new central station, Berlin Hauptbahnhof, is located nearby in Moabit.

Among others, the Reichstag (parliament), the office of the German Chancellor and several embassies, as well as the residence of the German President, Schloss Bellevue, and the nearby House of World Cultures ("Haus der Kulturen der Welt") and Carillon are located in the Tiergarten. The Brandenburg Gate and the Potsdamer Platz are situated on its eastern border, which used to be the frontier between East and West Berlin. The Tiergarten also contains several notable sculptures and sites of interest, including the four-tiered Victory Column, the Bismarck Memorial and several other memorials to prominent Prussian generals, all of which were located in the ceremonial park facing the Reichstag before they were moved to their present location by the Nazis. In addition, the tree-lined walkways emanating from the Victory column contain several ceremonial sculptures of Prussian aristocrats enacting an 18th century hunt. At the Victory Column, located at the heart of the Tiergarten, the German Live 8 concert took place on July 2, 2005.

The Tiergarten was largely deforested after 1944 because it served as a source of firewood for the devastated city. In 1945, the Soviet Union built a war memorial along the Straße des 17. Juni, the Tiergarten's main east-west artery, near the Brandenburg Gate.

The first Institut für Sexualwissenschaft (Institute for Sex Research) was situated here In den Zelten, near the contemporary Kongreßhalle, from 1919 until it was closed by the Nazis in 1933

Brandenburg

he Brandenburg Gate consists of twelve columns built in the Doric order of architecture, six on each side. This allows for five roadways, although originally ordinary citizens were only allowed to use the outer two. Above the gate is the Quadriga, with the goddess of peace driving it (the Quadriga) in triumph. The gate stands 26 m (65 ft) high, 65.5 m (213 ft) wide and 11 m (36 ft) thick.

The design of the gate was based on the Propylea, the gateway to the Acropolis in Athens, Greece. Berlin had a long history of classicism: first classicist Baroque and then a neo-Palladian, but this was the first Greek revival neo-classical structure in Berlin, which would become the Spreeathen ("Athens on the River Spree") by the 1830s, shaped by the severe neoclassicism of architect Karl Gotthard von Langhans. The Quadriga on the top was made by Johann Gottfried Schadow.

Napoleon in Berlin

While the main design of the Brandenburg Gate has remained the same since it was completed, the gate has played varying roles in Germany's history. First, Napoleon took the Quadriga to Paris in 1806 after conquering Berlin. When it returned to Berlin in 1814, the statue exchanged her olive wreath for the Iron Cross and became the goddess of victory.

When the Nazis rose to power, they used the gate to symbolize their power. The only structure left standing in the ruins of Pariser Platz in 1945, apart from the ruined Academy of Fine Arts, the gate was restored by the East Berlin and West Berlin governments. However, in 1961, the gate was closed when the Berlin Wall was built.

In 1963 U.S. President John F. Kennedy visited the Brandenburg Gate. The Soviets hung large banners across it so he could not see the East Berlin side. "The German question will remain open as long as the Brandenburg Gate is closed" was how the Mayor of West Berlin, Richard von Weizsäcker, described the situation in the early 1980s.

On June 12, 1987, U.S. President Ronald Reagan delivered a speech to the people of West Berlin at the Brandenburg Gate, yet it was also audible on the East Berlin side of the Wall. In the speech, President Reagan demanded that the Berlin Wall be torn down, delivering the following message to Soviet General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev:

“ General Secretary Gorbachev, if you seek peace, if you seek prosperity for the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, if you seek liberalization: Come here to this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, open this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall! ”

Finally, when the Berlin Wall fell during the Revolutions of 1989, the gate symbolized freedom and the unity of the city. It re-opened on 22 December 1989 when the West German Chancellor Helmut Kohl walked through to be greeted by the East German Prime Minister, Hans Modrow.

On July 12, 1994 U.S. President Bill Clinton addressed a speech to the people of Berlin at the Brandenburg Gate talking mainly about peace in post-Cold War Europe.

On December 21, 2000 workers began to once again refurbish the Brandenburg Gate, this time using lasers to clean off soot and grit. More than 1,000 pieces of stone were also replaced. Estimated cost: 3,000,000 USD in private funding.

There is some local controversy in Berlin over the fact that there is a Starbucks within a few yards of the gate. It is seen as a corporate intrusion upon a national treasure.

Cimitirul Memorial Mahnmal Holocaust

The Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe (German: Denkmal für die ermordeten Juden Europas), also known as the Holocaust Memorial (German: Holocaust-Mahnmal), is a memorial in Berlin to the Jewish victims of the Holocaust, designed by architect Peter Eisenman and engineers Buro Happold. It consists of a 19,000 square meter (4.7 acre) site covered with 2,711 concrete slabs or "stelae", arranged in a grid pattern on a sloping field. The stelae are 2.38m (7.8') long, 0.95m (3' 1.5") wide and vary in height from 0.2m to 4.8m (8" to 15'9"). According to Eisenman's project text, the stelae are designed to produce an uneasy, confusing atmosphere, and the whole sculpture aims to represent a supposedly ordered system that has lost touch with human reason. A 2005 copy of the Foundation for the Memorial's official English tourist pamphlet, however, states that the design represents a radical approach to the traditional concept of a memorial, partly because Eisenman did not use any symbolism. An attached underground "Place of Information" (German: Ort der Information) holds the names of all known Jewish Holocaust victims, obtained from the Israeli museum Yad Vashem.

The Konzerthausorchester Berlin (until 2006 known as the Berlin Symphony Orchestra in English and Berliner Sinfonie-Orchester in German) is a major symphony orchestra from Berlin, Germany. It was founded in 1952 in East Berlin. The Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, which had been founded ninety years earlier, was housed in West Berlin after the division of Berlin by the Allies after World War II.

As of October 2006 the Chief Conductor is Lothar Zagrosek.

The home of the orchestra is the Konzerthaus Berlin, designed by the architect Karl Friedrich Schinkel. The building was destroyed during World War II, and was rebuilt in between 1979 and 1984.

The orchestra performs around 100 concerts there every season. Apart from the masterworks of the classic-romantic tradition, the repertoire also comprises less frequently played compositions from those still being discovered to the most commanding contemporary music. Numerous invitations to perform have taken the orchestra around the world, in 2005 the BSO toured China, Japan and Korea. In 2006 there will be performances in Spain and southern Germany.

In latter years a 'generation changeover' has occurred in an unusually short amount of time. The influence of new, younger musicians from all over the world is becoming evident. The BSO has grown to be an important cornerstone in the diverse musical landscape of Berlin.

Checkpoint Charlie was the name given by the Western Allies to a crossing point between East Berlin and West Berlin during the Cold War. Other Allied checkpoints on the Autobahn to the West were Checkpoint Alpha at Helmstedt and Checkpoint Bravo at Dreilinden, southeast of Wannsee, named from the North Atlantic Treaty Organization's phonetic alphabet. Many other sector crossing points existed in Berlin. Some of these were designated for residents of West Berlin and West German citizens. Checkpoint Charlie was designated as the single crossing point (by foot or by car) for foreigners and members of the Allied forces. (Members of the Allied forces were not allowed to use the other sector crossing point designated for use by foreigners, the Friedrichstraße railway station.) Checkpoint Charlie was located at the junction of Friedrichstraße with Zimmerstraße and Mauerstraße (which coincidentally means 'Wall Street') in the Friedrichstadt neighborhood, which was divided by the Berlin Wall. The Soviets simply called it the Friedrichstraße Crossing Point[citation needed]. The East Germans officially referred to Checkpoint Charlie as the Grenzübergangsstelle ("Border Crossing Point") Friedrich-/Zimmerstraße.

Checkpoint Charlie became a symbol of the Cold War, representing the separation of east and west, and — for some East Germans — a gateway to freedom. It is frequently featured in spy movies and books, such as those by John le Carré. The famous cafe and viewing point for Allied officials, Armed Forces and visitors alike, Cafe Adler ("Cafe Eagle") is situated right on the checkpoint. It was an excellent viewing point to look into East Berlin, whilst having something to eat and drink.

The checkpoint was curiously asymmetrical. During its 27-year active life, the infrastructure on the Eastern side was expanded to include not only the wall, watchtower and zig-zag barriers, but a multi-lane shed where cars and their occupants were checked. However the American authorities, perhaps not wanting to concede that the division of Germany might be anything other than a temporary aberration, never erected any permanent buildings, and made do with the iconic wooden shed, which was replaced in the 1980s by a larger metal structure now on display at the Allied Museum in western Berlin. In the years after reunification, a reproduction of the 1960s-era wooden shed was placed at the site of the original.

Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Coordinates: 52°30′18″N, 13°20′06″E

Old and new parts

Inside the church

The Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church (in German: Kaiser-Wilhelm-Gedächtniskirche) is located in Berlin on the Kurfürstendamm in the center of the Breitscheidplatz. The old church was built between 1891 and 1895 according to plans by Franz Schwechten.

Emperor Wilhelm II ordered the construction of the church in honor of his grandfather Wilhelm I. The neo-romanesque style refers to many romanesque churches in the Rhineland.

The original construction was of impressive monumentality and size. Mosaics inside the church recalled the life and work of Emperor Wilhelm I. During World War II, the church was destroyed during a British RAF bombing raid in 1943. The only remainder of the old building is the ruin of the belfry, which are also referred to as "der Hohle Zahn" ("the hollow tooth").

Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church around 1900

Charlottenburg Palace

Initially, under the name of Lietzenburg, the palace was constructed in the Italian Baroque style by the architect Arnold Nering commissioned by Sophie Charlotte, the wife of Friedrich III, Elector of Brandenburg. After Friedrich's coronation in 1701 as King Friedrich I of Prussia and Charlotte his Queen, the palace, which was initially conceived as a summer retreat from Berlin (Sommerhaus) was expanded by the architect Eosander von Göthe into a magnificent building. After the death of his wife in 1705, Friedrich named the Schloss and the accompanying estate Charlottenburg in her memory. From 1709 to 1712 further building expansion was carried out, during which the characteristic turrets and the orangery appeared.

Inside the Charlottenburg Palace used to be what was described as "the eighth wonder of the world" — the Bernsteinzimmer, a room with its walls surfaced in decorative amber. The idea came from Danzig and Königsberg, where Gottfried Wolffram, Ernst Schacht and Gottfried Turau prepared the plans in 1701-09. The room was executed under the suprevision of Andreas Schlüter.

After the death of Friedrich I in 1713 Charlottenburg entered a new existence under its next owner, King Friedrich Wilhelm I. He gave the Amber Room in 1716 to Tsar Peter the Great as a present. Yet right after his death in 1740, the newly crowned King Friedrich II allowed Charlottenburg to be expanded by Georg Wenzeslaus von Knobelsdorff, whereupon east of the palace rose the New Wing. Subsequently, Friedrich's interest in Charlottenburg was extinguished in favour of the Schloss Sanssouci at Potsdam (completed by 1747).

Berliner Dom

The Berliner Dom or Berlin Cathedral in Berlin, Germany was built between 1895 and 1905. It faces the Lustgarten and the Berliner Stadtschloss (Berlin City Palace).

Later the church of the Dominican Order (Schwarze Brüder), located at the south side of the castle, was used as the first cathedral. The first church at this site was a baroque cathedral by Johann Boumann, which was completed in 1747 and, in 1822, remodelled in the neoclassicist style by the Berlin architect Karl Friedrich Schinkel.

In 1894, on German Emperor Wilhelm II's order, this domed building was demolished and replaced by the current cathedral designed by Julius Raschdorff. At 114 m long, 73 m wide and 116 m tall, it was much larger than any of the previous buildings and was considered a Protestant counterweight to St. Peter's Basilica in Vatican City.

During the Second World War, the building was bombed by the Allies and severely damaged. A temporary roof was installed to protect what remained of the interior and in 1975 reconstruction started. The restoration of the interior was begun in 1984 and in 1993 the church reopened. During reconstruction, the original design was modified into a simpler, less tall form.

Alexanderplatz is a large open square and public transport hub in Berlin city centre, near the river Spree and the Berliner Dom, at 52°31′19″N, 13°24′47″E

Coordinates: 52°31′19″N, 13°24′47″E

. Berliners often call it simply Alex.

Originally a cattle market, it was named in honour of a visit of the Russian Emperor Alexander I to Berlin on 25 October 1805. It gained a prominent role in the late 19th century with the construction of the station of the same name and a nearby public market, becoming a major commercial centre. Its heyday was in the 1920s, when together with Potsdamer Platz it was at the heart of Berlin's nightlife, inspiring the 1929 novel Berlin Alexanderplatz (see 1920s Berlin) and the two films based thereon, Piel Jutzi's 1931 film and Rainer Werner Fassbinder's 15 1/2 hour second adaptation, released in 1980.

The Alexanderplatz has been subject to redevelopment several times in its history, most recently during the 1960s, when it was enlarged as part of the German Democratic Republic's redevelopment of the city centre. It is surrounded by several notable structures including the Fernsehturm (TV Tower), the second tallest structure in Europe. Because of its high profile, many newcomers to Berlin mistake the nickname Alex and apply it to the Fernsehturm instead. The Alex also accommodates the Park Inn Berlin and the World Time Clock, a continually rotating installation that shows the time throughout the globe, the 1932 Alexanderhaus and Berolinahaus by Peter Behrens, and Hermann Henselmann's Haus des Lehrers.

Following German reunification the Alexanderplatz has undergone a gradual process of change with many of the surrounding buildings being renovated. Despite the construction of a tram line and the addition of some greenery it has retained its socialist character, including the much-graffitied Fountain of Friendship between Peoples (Brunnen der Völkerfreundschaft). In 1993 plans for a major redevelopment including the construction of several skyscrapers were published, but due to a lack of demand it is unlikely these will be constructed. However, beginning with the reconstruction of the department store Kaufhof in 2004, and the biggest underground railway station of Berlin, some buildings will be redesigned and new structures built on the square's south-eastern side.

Many historic buildings are located in the area around Alexanderplatz. The traditional seat of city government, the Rotes Rathaus, or Red City Hall, is located nearby, as is the former East German parliament building, the Palast der Republik, demolition of which began in February 2006.

Alexanderplatz is also the name of the S-Bahn and U-Bahn stations there.

Oberbaumbrücke

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

An U-Bahn train crosses the Oberbaumbrücke

The Oberbaumbrücke is a double-deck bridge crossing Berlin's River Spree, considered one of the city landmarks. It links Friedrichshain and Kreuzberg, former city districts that were divided by the Berlin Wall, and has become an important symbol of Berlin’s unity.

The bridge appears prominently in the 1998 film Run Lola Run.

[edit]

History

The bridge is built on the former city boundary with the Margraviate of Brandenburg, where an excise wall was built in 1732. A wooden drawbridge was built as part of the wall; it served as a gate to the city. The name Oberbaumbrücke stemmed from the heavy tree trunk, covered in metal spikes, that was used as a boom to block the river at night to prevent smuggling. (Baum means tree in German; thus the name means something like "bridge at the upper [Eastern] tree"; there was another tree-trunk barrier at the western end of the contemporary city limits.)

By 1879 the wooden bridge had been modified greatly. At 154 meters it was Berlin’s longest, but was no longer adequate to the amount of traffic crossing it. Plans began to be drawn up for a new stone construction. The Siemens & Halske company, which was planning to build the Berlin U-Bahn (subway), insisted on a combined crossing for road vehicles, pedestrians, and the new rail line.

The Oberbaumbrücke and former U-Bahn railway station Stralauer Tor, c. 1900

The towers were based on the Gothic brick Mitteltorturm in Prenzlau

The new bridge opened in 1896 after two years of construction, in time for the Berlin Trades Exhibition. The architect and government official Otto Stahn (1859-1930) designed it in North German gothic brick, in the style of a city gate with many decorative elements, such as pointed arches, cross vaults, and coats of arms. The two towers were inspired by the Middle Gate Tower (Mitteltorturm) in the northern Brandenburg city of Prenzlau. Although purely cosmetic, they served as a reminder that the site was once Berlin’s river gateway.

In 1902 the first segment of the U-Bahn opened. Its inaugural journey, carrying 19 passengers, ran from Stralauer Thor, at the eastern end of the bridge, to Potsdamer Platz. Stralauer Thor was dismantled after being damaged in a 1945 air raid, but its four sandstone-clad support posts can still be seen.

After Berlin absorbed several other municipalities in 1920, the Oberbaumbrücke became the crossing between the new districts of Friedrichshain and Kreuzberg. In April 1945 the Wehrmacht blew up the middle section of the bridge in an attempt to stop the Red Army from crossing it. After the war ended, Berlin was divided into four sectors. The Oberbaumbrücke crossed between the American and Soviet sectors. Until the mid-1950s, pedestrians, motor vehicles, and the city tramway were able to cross the bridge without difficulty.

When the Berlin Wall was built in 1961 the bridge became part of East Berlin's border with West Berlin; as all the waters of the River Spree were in Friedrichshain, the East German fortifications extended to the shoreline on the Kreuzberg side. The West Berlin U-Bahn line was forced to terminate at Schlesisches Tor. Beginning in 1963, the Oberbaumbrücke was used as a pedestrian border crossing for West Berlin residents only.

After the opening of the Wall in 1989, and German reunification the following year, the bridge was restored to its former appearance, albeit with a new steel middle section designed by the Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava. It opened to pedestrians and traffic on 9 November 1994, the fifth anniversary of the opening of the Berlin Wall. The U-Bahn line to Warschauer Straße was reopened a year later.

Since 1997, a neon installation entitled "Stone - Paper - Scissors" by Thorsten Goldberg has adorned the bridge. Its two elements are engaged in a constant game of rock, paper, scissors, suggesting the arbitrariness of immigration decisions, both during the Cold War and for today's asylum seekers and poverty migrants.

Since 1999, the traditional rivalry between the traditionally left-leaning districts Kreuzberg and Friedrichshain is played out in the annual "water battle", where residents from both areas, organized in groups with satirical names such as "Anarcho-Cynical Offensive Berlin - Friedrichshain Faction" or "Kreuzberg Landwehr" pelt each other with rotten vegetables, yello, eggs, flour and water and try to symbolically "reconquer" the "renegade" other district (Friedrichshain being mockingly referred to as "East Kreuzberg" and Kreuzberg as "Lower Friedrichshain") by driving their participants from the bridge. Due to their higher turnout and the superior "armament" (including home-built water cannons), the Friedrichshain detachments have won the water battle on a regular base.

With the creation of the unified Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg district in 2001, the Oberbaumbrücke no longer crossed a jurisdictional boundary.

Molecule man pe Spree

Spandau Weihnachtsmarkt

Jewish museum

About the Museum

Jewish Museum Berlin, Old Building and Libeskind Building

© Jewish Museum Berlin, photo: Bitter+Bredt, Berlin

The Jewish Museum Berlin first became known for its architecture - the building designed by Daniel Libeskind was already a much frequented place by Berliners and tourists in 1999, two years before the permanent exhibition was opened. The website also reflects the great interest in the architecture with texts and pictures of the two buildings: the Old Building (the baroque Collegienhaus) and the modern Libeskind Building.

Current announcements of the Museum, a detailed description of the Museum's history, and information on the Museum's management and Academic Advisory Board can also be found in this section of the website.

In afara orasului

Sachshausen - lagar

The camp was established in 1936. It was located at the edge of Berlin, which gave it a position among the German concentration camps: the administrative centre of all concentration camps was located in Oranienburg, and Sachsenhausen became a training centre for SS officers (who would often be sent to oversee other camps afterwards). Executions took place at Sachsenhausen, especially those that were Russian POW's.STAVKA .While some Jews were executed at Sachsenhausen and many died there, the Jewish inmates of the camp were relocated to Auschwitz in 1942. Sachsenhausen was not designed as a death camp—instead, the systematic mass murder of Jews was conducted primarily in camps to the east.

Arbeit Macht Frei gate

On the front entrance gates to Sachsenhausen is the infamous slogan Arbeit Macht Frei [German: "Work Makes You Free"]. About 200,000 people passed through Sachsenhausen between 1936 and 1945. Some 100,000 inmates died there from exhaustion, disease, malnutrition or pneumonia from the freezing cold. Many were executed or died as the result of brutal medical experimentation. According to an article published on December 13, 2001 in The New York Times, "In the early years of the war the SS practiced methods of mass killing there that were later used in the Nazi death camps. Of the roughly 30,000 wartime victims at Sachsenhausen, most were Russian prisoners of war, among them Stalin's oldest son."[2]

Amongst those executed were the commandos from Operation Musketoon and Grand Prix motor racing champion, William Grover-Williams, also John Godwin RNVR, a British Naval Sub-Lieutenant who managed to shoot dead the commander of his firing party, for which he was mentioned in dispatches posthumously. The wife and children of Rupprecht, Crown Prince of Bavaria, members of the Wittelsbach family, were held in the camp from October, 1944 to April, 1945, before being transferred to the Dachau concentration camp. Reverend Martin Niemöller, a critic of the Nazis and author of the poem First they came..., was also a prisoner at the camp. Herschel Grynszpan, whose act of assassination was used by Joseph Goebbels to initiate the Kristallnacht pogrom, was moved in and out of Sachshausen since his capture on the 18'th of July 1940 and until September 1940 when he was moved to Magdeburg.[3]

Sachsenhausen was the site of the largest counterfeiting operation ever. The Nazis forced Jewish artisans to produce forged American and British currency. Over one billion dollars in fake cash was recovered. The Germans were unable to put their plan into action. This fake currency is considered very valuable by collectors.

Many women were among the inmates of Sachsenhausen and its subcamps. According to SS files, more than 2,000 women lived in Sachsenhausen, guarded by female SS staff (Aufseherin). Camp records show that there was one male SS soldier for every ten inmates and for every ten male SS there was a woman SS. Several subcamps for women were established in Berlin, including in Neukolln.

Prisoners, 19 Dec 1938

With the advance of the Red Army in the spring of 1945, Sachsenhausen was prepared for evacuation. On April 20–21, the camp's SS staff ordered 33,000 inmates on a forced march westward. Most of the prisoners were physically exhausted and thousands did not survive this death march; those who collapsed en route were shot by the SS. On April 22, 1945, the camp's remaining 3,000 inmates, including 1,400 women were liberated by the Soviet Red Army and Polish 2nd Infantry Division of Ludowe Wojsko Polskie.

[edit]

The camp under the Soviets

In August 1945 the Soviet Special Camp No. 7 was moved to the area of the former concentration camp. Nazi functionaries were held in the camp, as were political prisoners and inmates sentenced by the Soviet Military Tribunal. By 1948, Sachsenhausen, now renamed Special Camp No. 1, was the largest of three special camps in the Soviet Zone of Occupation. The 60,000 people interned over five years included 6,000 German officers transferred from Western Allied camps. Others were Nazi functionaries, anti-Communists and Russians, including Nazi collaborators and soldiers who contracted sexually transmitted diseases in Germany[1]. By the closing of the camp in the spring of 1950, at least 12,000 had died of malnutrition and disease.

[edit]

The Sachsenhausen camp today

At present, the site of the Sachsenhausen camp is open to the public. Several buildings and structures survive or have been reconstructed, including guard towers, the camp entrance, crematory ovens and the camp barracks.

A large Soviet-style memorial obelisk was erected in 1961. Following German reunification, the camp was entrusted to a foundation who opened a museum on the site. The museum features artwork made by inmates and artifacts illustrating everyday life in the camp. Further exhibits are expected to open in late 2007, including the restored camp kitchen. The administrative buildings from which the entire Nazi concentration camp network was run have been preserved and can also be seen.

Following the discovery in 1990 of mass graves from the Soviet period, a separate museum has been opened documenting the camp's Soviet-era history, on an adjacent site

Ravensbrück

Ravensbrück was a notorious women's concentration camp during in World War II, located in northern Germany, 90 km north of Berlin at a site near the village of Ravensbrück (part of Fürstenberg/Havel). Construction of the camp began in November 1938 by SS leader Heinrich Himmler and was unusual in that it was a camp primarily for women. The camp opened in May 1939. In the spring of 1941, the SS authorities established a small men's camp adjacent to the main camp.

Between 1939 and 1945, over 130,000 female prisoners passed through the Ravensbrück camp system; only 40,000 survived. Although the inmates came from every country in German-occupied Europe, the largest single national group incarcerated in the camp, about 40,000, were Polish women.

Prisoners

The first prisoners at Ravensbrück were approximately 900 women. The SS had transferred these prisoners from the Lichtenburg women's concentration camp in Saxony in May 1939. By the end of 1942, the female inmate population of Ravensbrück had grown to about 10,000. In January 1945, the camp had more than 45,000 prisoners, mostly women.

There were children in the camp as well. At first, they arrived with mothers who were Gypsies or Jews incarcerated in the camp or were born to imprisoned women. There were few of them at the time. There were a few Czech children from Lidice in July 1942. Later the children in the camp represented almost all nations of Europe occupied by Germany. Between April and October 1944 their number increased considerably, consisting of two groups. One group was comprised of Roma children with their mothers or sisters brought into the camp after the Roma camp in Auschwitz-Birkenau was closed. The other group included mostly children who were brought with Polish mothers sent to Ravensbrück after the collapse of the Warsaw Uprising of 1944, and Jewish children after the Budapest Ghetto was closed. With a few exceptions all these children died of starvation. Ravensbrück had 70 sub-camps used for slave labor that were spread across an area from the Baltic Sea to Bavaria.

Among the thousands executed by the Germans at Ravensbrück were four female members of the SOE (Denise Bloch, Cecily Lefort, Lilian Rolfe, and Violette Szabo) as well as the Roman Catholic nun Élise Rivet, Elisabeth de Rothschild, Russian Orthodox nun St.Maria Skobtsova, the 25-year-old French Princess Anne de Bauffremont-Courtenay, and Olga Benário, wife of the Brazilian Communist leader Luís Carlos Prestes. The largest group of executed women at the Ravensbrück camp, 200 in total, was the Polish group of young patriots, members of the Polish Home Army.

Among the survivors of Ravensbrück camp was Christian author and speaker Corrie ten Boom. Corrie ten Boom and her family were arrested by the Nazis for harbouring Jews in their home in Haarlem, the Netherlands. The ordeal of Corrie and her sister, Betsie ten Boom, in the camp is documented in her book The Hiding Place which was also made into a movie.

Airlift  Monument

Berlin Airlift Monument in Berlin-Tempelhof, displaying the names of the 39 British and 31 U.S.-American pilots who lost their lives during the operation. Similar monuments can be found at the military airfield Wietzenbruch near Celle and at Rhein-Main Air Base.

Platz der Luftbrücke

10963 Berlin-Tempelhof

The Soviet War Memorial

The Soviet War Memorial (sometimes translated as the Soviet Cenotaph), is a vast war memorial and military cemetery in Berlin's Treptower Park. It was built to the design of the Soviet architect Yakov Belopolsky to commemorate 5,000 of the 20,000 Soviet soldiers who fell in the Battle of Berlin in April-May 1945. It opened four years after the war ended on May 8, 1949, and served as the central war memorial of East Germany.

The monument should not be confused with the Soviet War Memorial (Tiergarten), built in 1945 in the Tiergarten district of what would later become West Berlin, or the Soviet War Memorial (Schönholzer Heide), in Berlin's Pankow district.

Gendarmenmarkt

Der Gendarmenmarkt is a famous square in Berlin, and the site of the famous Konzerthaus and the French and German Cathedrals. The centre of the Gendarmenmarkt is crowned by a statue of Germany's famous poet Friedrich Schiller. The square was created by [Christian Unger] at the end of the seventeenth century as the Linden-Markt. The Gendarmenmarkt is named after the cuirassier regiment Gens d'Armes, which was deployed at this square until 1773.

During World War II most of the buildings were badly damaged or destroyed. Today all the buildings are restored to their former glory

Der Französiche Dom

The French Cathedral (in German: Französischer Dom) the older of the two cathedrals was built by the Huguenot community between 1701 and 1705. The cathedral was modeled after the destroyed Huguenot church in Charenton-Saint-Maurice, France. The tower and porticos, designed by Carl von Gontard, were added to the building in 1785. The French cathedral has a viewing platform, a restaurant and a Huguenot museum.

Der Deutsche Dom

The German Cathedral (in German: Deutscher Dom) is located in the south of the Gendarmenmarkt. It has a pentagonal structure which was designed by Martin Grünberg and built in 1708 by Giovanni Simonetti. In 1785 it was modified by Carl von Gontard, who build the domed tower. The German cathedral was completely destroyed during World War II through fire in 1945. After the German reunification the cathedral was rebuilt, finished in 1993 and re-opened in 1996 as a museum of German history.

Das Konzerthaus

The Konzerthaus is the most recent building on the Gendarmenmarkt. It was built by Karl Friedrich Schinkel in 1821 as the Schauspielhaus. It was based on the ruins of the National Theatre, which was destroyed by fire in 1817. Parts of the building contain columns and some outside walls from the destroyed National Theatre. Like the other buildings on this square, it was also badly damaged during World War II. The reconstruction, finished in 1984, turned the theatre into a concert hall. Today, it is the home of the Konzerthausorchester Berlin.

The Gendarmenmarkt hosts one of Berlin's most popular Christmas Markets.

Deutsches Historisches Museum

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Coordinates: 52°31′06″N, 13°23′46″E

Facade of the Zeughaus, the Museum's main building

The extension of the museum

The Deutsches Historisches Museum (DHM), German Historical Museum, was founded in 1987 by the chancellor of Germany, Helmut Kohl and the mayor of Berlin, Eberhard Diepgen on the occasion of the 750th anniversary of the founding of Berlin. It is situated in the Zeughaus, the oldest structure on the Unter den Linden avenue in central Berlin.

In 2004 an extension to the DHM, designed by I. M. Pei, was completed. In 2006 the restoration of the Zeughaus building, founded in 1695, was completed and the DHM Museum opened with a German History in Images and Testimonials from Two Millenia and artifacts exhibit.

Adresse:
Deutsches Historisches Museum Unter den Linden 2 10117 Berlin

Bode Museum

The Bode Museum

The Bode Museum belongs to the group of museums on Museum Island in Berlin and is a historically preserved building. The museum was designed by architect Ernst von Ihne and completed in 1904. Originally called the Kaiser-Friedrich-Museum after Emperor Frederick III, the museum was renamed in honor of its first curator, Wilhelm von Bode, in 1956.

Closed for repairs since 1997, the museum was reopened on October 18, . Now it is the home for a collection of sculptures, Byzantine art, and coins and medals.

The sculpture collection shows art of the Christian Orient (with an emphasis on Coptic Egypt), sculptures from Byzantium and Ravenna, sculptures of the Middle Ages, the Italian Gothic, and the early Renaissance. Late German Gothic works are also represented by Tilman Riemenschneider, the south German Renaissance, and Prussian baroque art up to the 18th century. In the future selected works of the Gemäldegalerie will be integrated into the sculpture collection. This is reminiscent of William von Bode's concept of "style rooms", in which sculptures, paintings, and crafts are viewed together, as was usual in upper middle-class private collections.

The Münzkabinett ("coin cabinet"), currently housed at the neighboring Pergamon Museum, is one of the world's largest numismatic collections. Its range spans from the beginning of minting in the seventh century B.C. in Asia Minor up to the present day. With approximately 750,000 items the collection is a unique archive for historical research, while its medal collection makes it an important art exhibition at the same time.

Anschrift
Bodestraße 1-3, 10178
Berlin-Mitte

Verkehrsverbindungen
S-Bahn: Hackescher Markt: S5, S7, S75, S9

The location in the heart of Berlin with an outstanding architecture

The Tempodrom was opened in the year 2001 with the European Film Awards. Due to the multifunctional architecture of the Big and the Small Arena as well as of the Foyer, the Tempodrom is considered to be the quick-change artist among the event locations of Berlin. Beneath its spectacular 30m high roof up to 3.500 guests altogether can experience unforgettable moments.

At just five minutes walking distance from Potsdamer Platz, the Tempodrom is situated in a well-manicured parkland in the middle of the vibrant heart of Berlin.
It is conveniently located to the public transport and to the City motorway (A 100), exit Tempelhofer Damm.