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Whitlam's Berlin Tours

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24/11/2024

Join me on Bluesky! 🦋

18/11/2024

The headless soldier 💀

💒 It adorns the Church at Südstern, which was originally intended to be used by soldiers stationed nearby

🪖 The statue was added in 1929 to honour the Garde-Pionier-Bataillon, elite engineers who built bridges and fortifications during WWI

💣 The statue WWII bombings but due to connotations with it glorifying war, it has become a target for criticism and vandalism

🧐 Around 2008 its head was removed - apparently no one knows where it ended up!

14/11/2024

“A British bomber robbed me of my one and all” 🪦

🌳 The grave, presumably, of a mother and son in the Stahnsdorf cemetery

💥 …and WWII bombs on display in the

☝️ I just happened to visit these places days apart. The message on the graves so personal, really got me. Very often the large tragedies of WWII are reduced to how many thousands of people were killed. It’s important to remember that it was individuals who were affected.

12/11/2024

Due to popular demand, here are four more pay what you want tours you can join *this weekend* 😀

📆 On Saturday the 16th it’s Karl-Marx-Allee in the morning and Weimar Berlin in the afternoon.

📆 Then, on the 17th, Jewish Berlin under the “Third Reich” followed by a Berlin Wall History tour

🙋‍♂️ Want to sign up?  📲 Check my Story or the link in my bio!

02/11/2024

I was very lucky to spend yesterday with a wonderful school group. I’ll be honest, school tours can be challenging, but this lot were so full of questions and insights, I could really tell they were engaged and interested. What a pleasure!

31/10/2024

Comment “Tour” to sign up

or go click the link in my bio 😉

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🗺️ This weekend I thought I’d do two opposites - Karl-Marx-Allee workers’ paradise on Saturday, and its exact opposite, the Grunewald district on Sunday

📆 Yes, Nov 9 is a crazy day in German history, a (failed) revolution, an actual revolution, another failed revolution, terror, and another revolution… let’s watch out backs that day, yeah?

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REMEMBER - only sign up if you 100% definitely actually intend to come. If you can’t make it in the end, that’s cool, but cancel your ticket online so someone else can have it.

29/10/2024

Tränenpalast – the “Palace of Tears” – once marked the divide between East and West Berlin 😢

🛂 Built in 1962, this border crossing at Friedrichstraße station saw countless emotional farewells, as families and friends were torn apart by the Berlin Wall

🚉 West Berliners could visit the East for short trips, but East Berliners rarely got the chance to go the other way, making goodbyes here especially heartbreaking

✨ Today, it’s a museum where visitors can explore stories of separation, escape, and everyday life in divided Berlin

24/10/2024

The Berlin Airlift Memorial at Platz der Luftbrücke ✈️

🌍 It commemorates the huge effort of 1948-49 airlift that kept West Berlin supplied during the Soviet blockade solely by air

💼 Food, water, clothes, medicine and more were needed to keep a city with a population of 2+ million alive

🛬 At its height planes were landing in West Berlin almost once per minute

☝️ You have to think how terrifying it must have been for Berliners to have British and American flying overhead - WWII ended only 3 years before the airlift began

🕊️ 78 pilots and crew lost their lives ensuring food, fuel, and supplies reached the city

🇬🇧🇺🇸🇫🇷 Think how that changed the Berliners’ perception of the Western allies - those who destroyed the city were now risking their lives to save its people

⚡️ Over 2 million tons of supplies in less than a year

🧱 West Berlin would never face a serious, sustained blockade again, even when the Berlin went up

🐹 Nevertheless, supplies were kept on hand, just in case

🚇 You can find this memorial at Platz der Luftbrücke - it’s easily accessible via the U-Bahn station with the same name

22/10/2024

A bomb from the U.S. Army Air Forces’ 1945 raid on Oranienburg 💣

⚛️ In March 1945, over 600 bombers targeted this town to destroy a uranium facility linked to N**i nuclear research

🚫 The aim? To stop the Soviets from seizing it as they advanced towards Berlin

🔎 Despite the devastation, Soviet forces still found enough uranium here to boost their own atomic bomb project

🧨 This bomb, now safely displayed outside the historic post office near the train station, reminds us of that day, March 15, 1945, when this small town was hit with an air raid so big that usually it would have been reserved for major cities

💣 unexploded bombs are still regularly found in the area to this date

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Fun fact! About 2 years ago, while leading a tour around the Sachsenhausen memorial for @ my group and I actually heard one of these bombs being blown up. The explosion was intentional, it had been deemed that this bomb, found during routine checks for these kinds of things, was just too dangerous to dispose of any other way. That means that just once in my life have I heard a singular WWII bomb explode. I can tell you, it was a brown pants moment for all of us. It caught us all off guard.

It really made us think how terrifying it would have been to hear 600 bombers flying overhead, each of them dropping as many bombs as they could. It must have felt like the end of the world to the people of Oranienburg. What would the concentration camp prisoners have thought?

By this point, Sachsenhausen was pretty much at its most crowded, the prisoners would have known the end of the “Third Reich” was near, but would have likely felt like they themselves were in a hopeless position. Would the air raid have given them hope that the end was that bit closer? Or terrified them, thinking that they might have been hit?

21/10/2024

At first, you might think this is the Berlin Wall. In fact, it’s a completely different wall loaded with Cold War history 🇵🇱

🧱 This piece of wall comes from Gdańsky’s Lenin shipyard, where in 1980, L**h Wałęsa led the strike that started the Solidarność (Solidarity) movement

⚒️ Solidarność began as a trade union, fighting for better working conditions, but quickly grew into a national movement challenging the communist regime

💪 It became the first independent trade union in a communist country, and helped bring down Poland’s communist system, inspiring other movements across Eastern Europe in the late ‘80s, including in East Germany

📅 The wall was installed here on 17 June 2009, just a few metres from where the Berlin Wall once stood, marking the anniversary of the 1953 East German uprising, where Soviet tanks and soldiers brutally shut down East German protests

16/10/2024

Beaten to death & silenced to death: to the homosexual victims of National Socialism

🙏 This memorial stands outside Nollendorfplatz station, home of Berlin’s gay district pre- and post-N**i dictatorship

🔕 Beaten to death we can understand, but what’s meant by “silenced to death”?

❌ The fact is that tolerance towards homosexuality took a long time after the N**is were defeated

☝️ In fact, it remained illegal to be gay in both East & West Germany until the late 1960s, though the East were more tolerant in this regard

🇩🇪 That meant that when the two Germanys were founded in 1949, gay men that had been forced to wear the pink triangle in the concentration camps were the only group that couldn’t talk about their experiences

🏳️‍🌈 Their sexuality, relationships, and true selves had to remain hidden

12/10/2024

Amazing group on today’s pay-what-you-want tour 🥰 Thank you all for coming. Look out for more tours in November!

10/10/2024

Willi Sänger was a German athlete turned resistance fighter ✊

⚔️ He worked as a key organiser for the Communist resistance against the N**is

📜 Sänger helped distribute the illegal magazine Die Innere Front, encouraging workers to resist

💥 He was arrested in July 1944 after his group was betrayed, having been infiltrated by a Gestapo informant

💀 He was sentenced to death

🪦 On 27 November 1944, he was executed by guillotine in Brandenburg Görden Prison

🇩🇪 In East Germany, he was honoured as a hero, with many streets and institutions bearing his name

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Image of Willi Sänger: Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-1988-1113-004 / CC-BY-SA 3.0

06/10/2024

Josef Thorak’s bronze horses were made in the 1930s for Hitler’s New Reich Chancellery 🐎

🛠️ They symbolised N**i ideals of strength and power - just look at how over the top the muscles on the horse are

🕵️‍♂️ but they vanished after WWII, long considered smashed to bit in the war…

📦 It turns out the Soviet army moved them to Brandenburg, where they were hidden until the late ‘80s

🎭 After being traded on the black market in the chaos around the end of the Cold War, they resurfaced in 2015 during a raid led by the police and art detective Arthur Brand

⚖️ After legal disputes one of these monumental horses is now on display in the Spandau Citadel - the exhibit of ‘forbidden statues’ is well worth a visit!

05/10/2024

🌳 The Humboldthain Flak Tower, constructed between 1941 and 1942, was one of three towering anti-aircraft bunkers built to defend Berlin from Allied bombers. These colossal structures were designed to withstand intense bombardment, with reinforced concrete walls up to 3.5 metres thick

🛡️ Armed with four twin 128mm anti-aircraft guns on the upper platforms, the Humboldthain tower could fire at enemy planes flying as high as 14,800 metres. It also had smaller 20mm and 37mm guns positioned to defend against low-flying aircraft

💥 Ultimately, the towers provided psychological support, and physical protection for Berliners; in terms of shooting down planes and stopping bombs from hitting the city centre, they failed

💣 during air raids and the battle of Berlin they could offer shelter to over 10,000 civilians at a time

💀 Conditions inside were tense, and stressful. Civilians were left to wonder what kind of world they would walk outside to - would their home still be standing? What their friends and family be killed?

⚫️ As the Red Army approached in the dying days of the war, many Berliners, particularly women, decided to jump from the towers’ stairs, choosing death on their own terms instead of brutal treatment, particularly r**e, at the hands of the invading army

🚇 Today, the tower’s partially surviving structure can be visited in Humboldthain Park, a short walk from Berlin-Gesundbrunnen station. Though much of it was destroyed and buried after the war, parts of the bunker remain accessible via Berliner Unterwelten’s tours

03/10/2024

The Bunker am Heckeshorn in Wannsee was built in 1943 during WWII 🏗️

🏢 It was a key air defence command centre for Berlin, coordinating Flak units and fighter planes

📡 After the war, it was used for communication during the Berlin Blockade/Airlift - one of the most important episodes of the Cold War

🏥 In the 80s it became an emergency hospital with room for 400 patients

🛑 Today, it’s closed to the public, but is sometimes open for special tours

⛑️ The bunker walls are made from 4m-thick (12 foot) steel-reinforced concrete - hard to get rid of - and so, it’s still here today!

02/10/2024

Arno Breker was perhaps Hitler’s favourite sculptor 🏛️

🎨 His Berlin studio was built so that he could continue making huge statues for the N**i’s ever-growing number of construction projects and monuments

🚫 Breker mostly didn’t use the studio much though - he worked in another one out of town, safe from WWII bombs

⚒️ Post-war, having survived the war mostly intact, it became a workspace for other artists

✨ Today, it’s Kunsthaus Dahlem, showcasing modernist art, and home to a lovely cafe ☕️

30/09/2024

Hans Poelzig’s Neue Sachlichkeit vision at its finest 🎬

✨ Built in 1929, the Babylon Kino is all about clean lines and minimalist design

📐 The New Objectivity style, the hot new thing at the time, shines through with its straight lines and smooth curves

🎞️ Berlin was one of the most important places in the world for film when the Babylon Kino opened

🎥 Movies such as Nosferatu, Sinfonie der Großstadt, and Blue Angel were landmark pieces of cinema

🫀 The Babylon is a great place to see them today! Not only do they show films from the birth of German cinema, but they do themed movie runs, and some of the old movies are accompanied by a live organ player, just like the old days - perhaps the last showings of their kind in the world!

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Did you ever notice the Königskollonaden? 🏛️ They don’t really fit in, right? 🕰️ Today, they make up the entrance to Kleist Park in the Berlin district of Schöneberg 🔍 But you used to be able to find them elsewhere 🗺️ Which makes for a good excuse to look at not one, not two, but three historic maps of Berlin! 🚂 As we can see, they were moved thanks for the rapidly growing industrial city of late-19th/early 20th Century Berlin - we needed room for shops and railways, not historic colonnades! ++++++ Painting Eduard Gaertner, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons 1903 Zander & Labisch, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons 1909 Waldemar Franz Hermann Titzenthaler, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

📍 This is where Claus Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg and his co-conspirators were executed after the failed July 20, 1944 plot 🪧 The memorial you see here honours them, but it’s not without controversy 💣 Stauffenberg had placed a bomb under a table during a meeting with Hitler, then flew back to Berlin to lead the coup 🛩️ Before he even landed, the news broke – Hitler survived, and the coup failed 🪑 It turns out the bomb blast had flipped a table up into Hitler’s face, leaving him injured, angry, and very much alive 🗺️ After landing in Berlin Stauffenberg, alongside Friedrich Olbricht, Albrecht Mertz von Quirnheim, Werner von Haeften, and Ludwig Beck were brought to the Bendlerblock, Wehrmacht HQ, put against the wall, and executed ⛓️ The statue representing their bravery was installed in 1953, but it raises questions – they were high-ranking officers in Hitler’s military, many of them only turning against him in the final phase of the war 🤔 For me, this is an odd group to pick to be the first to receive a memorial in post-WWII Berlin ⚫️ Especially when you find out that the sculptor was Richard Scheibe, an artist who had himself greatly benefitted from the regime, being considered a ‘God-gifted talent’, exempting him from war duties ++++++ 📸 Stauffenberg at the Wolfsschanze Bundesarchiv, Bild 146-1984-079-02 CC-BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons 📸 Aftermath of the Explosion Bundesarchiv, Bild 146-1972-025-12 CC-BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons

The Oberbaumbrücke has been through a lot… 🌉 🪵 Built in the early 1700s, it was originally a simple wooden bridge regulating river traffic and controlling goods (and taxes) coming to Berlin 🏰 By the late 1800s, Berlin needed something more modern - so it was rebuilt in a neo-Gothic style, combining medieval design with the needs of a growing city 🚇 In fact, the bridge was ready for cars, and Berlin’s new U-Bahn trains, which wouldn’t start rolling Berliners around Berlin until 1902, a few years after the bridge was opened 💣 Was it ready for the 20th Century? No. But that couldn’t be planned for. War, Walls and revolution were to come - the bridge was blown up right at the end of WWII and later became part of the Berlin Wall 🧱 Since it sat right on the border between East & West, the bridge was closed off on August 13, 1961 🎄 In 1963 it reopened as a pedestrian border crossing allowing West Berliners to visit family in the East over Christmas and New Year 🚧 It then become a tightly controlled border crossing point for civilians during the Cold War 🤝 Until it once again connected the two halves of Berlin following the fall of the Berlin Wall ++++++ 📸 German Troops at Polish border Hans Sönnke Public domain via Wikimedia Commons 📸 Oberbaumbrücke 1990 Roehrensee CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons 📸 Crowds at the Berlin Wall, 1990 SSGT F. Lee Corkran Public domain via Wikimedia Commons 📸 Original Bridge, Märkisches Museum Model Sol Octobris CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons 📸 Map of German Empire by population density, c. 1885 Meyers Konversations-Lexikon, 4th ed., vol. 4 Public domain via Wikimedia Commons 📸 Bridge under construction, 1895 Hermann Rückwardt Public domain via Wikimedia Commons 📸 Postcard Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons 📸 Oberbaumbrücke, 1950 Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-S95058 CC-BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons 📸 Map of Berlin Wall Jkan997 CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Comm

Locked up far from home, British subjects built a mini-society in a German prison camp in Berlin during WWI 🏰 ⚽️ Football legend Steve Bloomer came to Berlin to coach Britannia Berlin, but war broke out, and he, and other British subjects of ‘fighting age’ found themselves interned at Ruhleben 🐎 It was a barely converted horse racing track 💡 Conditions were brutal at first - overcrowded, freezing, muddy, and with horrendous bathrooms - one man died from pneumonia early on 🏟️ Soon though, the prisoners organised themselves 🎭 They created a library, hosted stage shows, lectures, and played sports 👮‍♂️ Some of the guards even watched the games! ⛓️‍💥 After 4 years, the prisoners were freed during Germany’s November revolution ✊ That revolution brought down the Kaiser, and finally brought an end to WWI ++++++ 📸 Public Domain images from Wikimendia Commons 🖼️ Paintings by Nico Jungman (public domain, via Wikimedia Commons) ++++++ Bundesarchiv Images 📸 November Revolution, Berlin Bundesarchiv, B 145 Bild-P011502 CC-BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons 📸 Kaiser Wilhelm II, Nov 1918 Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-R12318 Victor Sniekers CC-BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons

Ampelmann = Traffic Light Man, easy! 🚦 🎂 Happy birthday, Ampelmann! Karl Peglau first came submitted his idea to create the beloved symbol on October 13, 1961  🔴 He was then createdby both Karl Peglau & Anneliese Wegner  🎉 Ampelmann became an instant hit, appearing on TV and in schools  🛑 In the 1990s, the government planned to remove him, but artist Markus Heckhausen saved the day  🛍️ Ampelmann was transformed into decorations, mugs, key rings, sweeties, and more!  🌆 Today, you’ll find Ampelmann all over former East West Berlin, as well as what used to be East Germany ++++++ Image Rights Ampelmann Symbol Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons Potsdamer Platz Verkehrsturm, 1924 Bundesarchiv, Bild 102-00843 / CC-BY-SA 3.0, CC BY-SA 3.0 DE <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/de/deed.en>, via Wikimedia Commons Map of East & West Germany TUBS, CC BY-SA 3.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0>, via Wikimedia Commons Reichstag, 1990 Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-1990-1003-417 / CC-BY-SA 3.0, CC BY-SA 3.0 DE <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/de/deed.en>, via Wikimedia Commons

Eva Kemlein, Berlin photographer 📸 💍 In 1932, she met journalist Herbert Kemlein, and they soon married 🇬🇷 They settled in Greece, but despite the distance, the Nazis reached them. As a Jewish woman, Eva made her husband a target of the regime 🚫 Unable to work, the couple struggled until they were deported to Germany in 1937. Soon after arriving in Berlin, they separated ⚠️ Eva hid with her new partner, anti-fascist Werner Stein, moving 30 times and distributing anti-Nazi leaflets, risking their lives 🎥 Through everything, Eva kept her beloved Leica camera 📸 After the war, she became a photographer for Berliner Zeitung, documenting a shattered Berlin and the clearing of debris by “rubble women” 🏛️ Eva remained in East Berlin, photographing stars of the theatre and was thought to be a supporter of the East German communist regime 🌍 When she passed away in 2004, she left behind over 330,000 negatives, now held by the Stadtmuseum - what an incredible treasure! ++++++ Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-H28422 CC-BY-SA 3.0, CC BY-SA 3.0 DE via Wikimedia Commons Government of Germany Public domain via Wikimedia Commons No 5 Army Film & Photographic Unit Hewitt (Sgt) Public domain via Wikimedia Commons © Kameraprojekt Graz 2015 Wikimedia Commons License: CC-BY-SA 4.0 User:FA2010, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-09128-0006 Igel; Kemlein, Eva CC-BY-SA 3.0, CC BY-SA 3.0 DE via Wikimedia Commons Janczikowsky CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-S88809A Kemlein, Eva CC-BY-SA 3.0, CC BY-SA 3.0 DE via Wikimedia Commons Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-08687-0010 Kemlein, Eva / CC-BY-SA 3.0, CC BY-SA 3.0 DE via Wikimedia Commons Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-08687-0006 Kemlein, Eva; Igel / CC-BY-SA 3.0, CC BY-SA 3.0 DE via Wikimedia Commons Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-S84441 Kemlein, Eva CC-BY-SA 3.0, CC BY-SA 3.0 DE via Wikimedia Commons ++++++ Sources Stadtmuseum Berlin, “Eva Kemlein”, Dr. Martina We

Check my stories or DM for the link! Let’s explore Berlin together on a quick tour of Berlin’s most famous sights. We’ll meet outside the Asisi Berlin Wall panorama at Checkpoint Charlie at 11:00 on Saturday, October 12. Spots are limited so sign up now!

🎉 Thank Heinz Zellermayer for your all night parties in Berlin! 🏨 The Hotel am Steinplatz is a Berlin institution 🕰️ Opening its doors in the early 20th Century, it was home to escaped Russian nobility 💪 Managing to stay open during the “Third Reich” and (mostly) survive WWII, the hotel was handed over to the original owner’s children 🍸 In 1949, in an effort to keep his business running, keep his bar open, and make West Berlin more fun, one of the owners, Heinz Zellermayer, convinced the Americans to allow West Berlin bars to stay open all night 🥃 All it took was a nice chat and a couple of whiskies ++++++ Cold War Berlin Map Stefan-Xp, CC BY-SA 3.0 <http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/>, via Wikimedia Commons ++++++ Sources Berlin 1936, Oliver Hilmes Tagesspiegel, “Berlin Heinz Zellermayer (Geb. 1915)”, Lars von Törne “How a whiskey-fuelled meeting in 1949 led to Berlin’s famed techno scene”, NPR, Bobby Allyn “Heinz Zellermayer and Berlin’s Never-Ending Party”, Red Bull Music Academy, Cristina Plett & Liam Cobb

🏠 Berlin still has some surviving Third Reich architecture… but not what you’d expect 🌲 These picturesque houses near Krumme Lanke were built for SS officials and their families 🏡 The houses were influenced by the garden city movement and “Heimatschutz” style 👨‍👩‍👧‍👦 They were designed to create an ideal community for the ‘perfect’ citizens 🛠️ Built between 1938 and 1940, only half of the planned houses were completed 🌍 After WWII, the homes were used to house refugees and resistance fighters 📜 In 1992, the houses were placed under memorial protection ++++++ 📸 Garden City Diagram Ebenezer Howard (1850-1928), Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons 📸 SS Men Bundesarchiv, Bild 101III-Lerche Stereo-046-03 Lerche, Karl-Gustav / CC-BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons 📸 SS Men in Berlin Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-H15390 / CC-BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons

🏃‍♂️ In the 1936 Berlin Olympics, Japan took gold in the marathon, but the winner, Sohn Kee-Chung, wasn’t Japanese—he was Korean, forced to compete under Japan’s flag as “Kitei Son” due to the brutal occupation of Korea 🥇 On the podium, Sohn subtly covered the Japanese flag on his uniform with a laurel branch 💪 His face wasn’t one of victory, but of stony-faced determination 📰 Back in Korea, the Dong-a Ilbo newspaper published his photo, but they removed the Japanese flag ⛓️ The result? Staff were arrested, and the paper was shut down for nearly a year 🇰🇷 Sohn Kee-Chung became a symbol of resistance, and after Korea’s liberation in 1945, he dedicated himself to coaching athletes. ⛓️‍💥 While not imprisoned for his act of defiance, he lived under Japanese rule until WWII ended 🔥 Today, he remains a national hero in Korea, with his story taught in schools 🏟️ He’s remembered in the Berlin Olympic stadium, and even though his name is written in the Japanese style to preserve the historic integrity of the site, you can see that someone tried to change “Japan” to “Korea”… +++++++ 📸 Sohn Kee-Chung, Berlin 1936 Asahi Shinbun, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons 📸 Sohn Kee-Chung, Berlin 1936 Medal Ceremony Japanese / German press at the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons 📸 Koreans celebrating liberation, 1945 한국어: KBS 스페셜 8.15 광복특집 - 기억의 재구성, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

💣 On June 27th, 1995, a group of robbers stormed a bank in Zehlendorf 🚨 Hostages were taken at gunpoint… but the real heist was happening underground 🛠️ The thieves had spent over a year digging a tunnel from a nearby garage 💰 Two robbers broke into the bank’s basement while four others held 16 hostages upstairs 🚁 The gang demanded 17 million marks, a helicopter, and an escape car to buy time ⌛ Hours passed, tensions rose, and police handed over 5.62 million marks 👀 But when police stormed the bank at 3:43 a.m., the robbers had already vanished through their tunnel 🔍 They left behind clues, and police tracked them down… but much of the loot was never recovered ++++++ Images made via AI with ChatGPT/Dall E 3

A Nazi symbol at the Lichtenberg Town Hall? 🏛️ 🚨 79 years after WWII, a swastika is still visible 📸 A couple noticed it in their wedding photos ⚒️ The symbol was added in 1937 but partially hidden after the war 🗣️ Local politicians are pushing for its removal 🏰 But the building is protected as a historic site ❓ Should it stay or go? ++++++ Source: Birgit Bürkner, “Streit um Hakenkreuz-Rathaus Lichtenberg,” B.Z., 19 September 2024