25th Anniversary:

Fall of the Berlin Wall

Darryl Heron

In 2014 the World Celebrates...

25th Anniversary of the Fall of the Berlin Wall (November 9, 1989)

& 24th Anniversary of German Reunification (October 3, 1990

If every decade is a generation,two & a half generations only know Berlin and Germany as they are today

It is difficult for them to imagine it any other way...

After World War II

Germany was divided into East and West...

German Demorcatic Republic (GDR, East Germany) &

Federal Republic of Germany (FRG, West Germany)

The world accepted a divided Berlin

The Wall divided a city, but it also represented a Cold War wallbetween East and West...

Construction of the Wall begain on August 13, 1961 & over the years it went through 4 versions*

-Wire fence (1961)-Improved wire fence (1962-1965)-Concrete wall (1965-1975)-Grenzbauer 75, or the Border Wall (1975-1989)

Berlin looked like this...

For those of us that didn‘t live in a divided Germany, it is hard to imagine, families being torn apart, sometimes not seeing each other for years (if at all)

It it easy to forget the human element behind the history...

Without a whole lot of notice to the outside world... There were lots of revolutions in the then Communist Eastern and Central Europe Momentum seemed to be building in 1989.

There was something in the air...

Basic Timeline*Date Event

August 19,1989 Hungary basically disables the physical boarder with Austria

September 1989 13,000+ East German escaped to Austria via Hungry

Similar events happened in Czechoslovakia

October 18, 1989 Longtime leader of East Germany Erich Honecker resigns & replaced by Egon Krenz

November 4, 1989

500,000+ gather at the Alexanderplatz Demonstration

November 9, 1989

In agreement with with Czechoslovak government Krenz to allow refugees direct crossing between East & West German crossings effective next day

Günter Schabowski, not properly briefed of the agreement, holds press conference & reads note he was given. Tells press the agreement was effective immediately

Basic Timeline Continued...*Date Event

7:17 pm & 8 pm Anchorman Hans Joachim Friedrichs said on air „This is a historic day. East Germany has announced that starting immediately, its borders are open to everyone. The GDR is opening its borders...the gates in the Berlin Wall stand open“

After hearing the broadcast, East Germans gathered at the check points and the Wall, waiting for the gates to be openned as they had been promised

After several frantic phone calls guards were ordered to only let the „more agressive“ people through, putting a special stamp on their passports, banning them from returning to East Germany

10:45 pm Without orders for deadly force being issued, guards yielded opening the checkpoints

East & West Berliners danced on the Wall in celebration

Do you feel the history?

The date the Wall fell is considered to be November 9, 1989

„Official“ dismantling started on June 13, 1990 and ended in December 1990*

Now... there are memorials where the Wall once stood

November 9, 1989 the Wall fell...

And the world was not going to be the same again!

After the Wall fell,East and West Germany negotiated, planned, worked, and the once „unimaginable“ Reunificaton of Germany took place at 12:00 CET on October 3, 1990

Every year on October 3rd,Germans celebrate that their country is reunited

This is what the historic Brandenburg Gate looked like to me in May 2012

There is much to celebrateon the 25th Anniversary of the Fall of the Wall and in the Reunification of Germany...

While we celebrate this triumph of the human spirit and the reunion of families, friends, and countrymen...

Let us not build any new walls and remember that the human race emerged from this dark time in history and we can triumph again...

There is plenty of resource material on the Wall, German Reunification, and the Revolutions of 1989Why not check the resources mentioned in the Wikipedia entries and boarden your own discovery and reading from there...

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