Berlin - Potsdamer Platz

Berlin is the capital and largest city of Germany. The city is one of Germany's 16 federal states.

The first records of towns in the area of present-day Berlin date from the late 12th century. The central part of Berlin can be traced back to two towns. Cölln on the Fischerinsel is first mentioned in 1237 and Berlin, across the river Spree in 1244. The two towns over time formed close economic and social ties, and profited from the staple right on the two important trade routes Via Imperii and from Bruges to Novgorod.

In 1415, Frederick I became the elector of the Margraviate of Brandenburg. His successors established Berlin-Cölln as capital of the margraviate, and subsequent members of the Hohenzollern family ruled in Berlin until 1918, first as electors of Brandenburg, then as kings of Prussia, and eventually as German emperors.

The Thirty Years' War between 1618 and 1648 devastated Berlin. The city lost half of its population. Frederick William, known as the "Grosse Kurfürst" initiated a policy of promoting immigration and religious tolerance from 1640 on. In 1685, Frederick William offered asylum to the French Huguenots. By 1700, approximately 30 percent of Berlin's residents were French Huguenots. Other immigrants came from Bohemia and Poland.

The Industrial Revolution transformed Berlin during the 19th century; the city's economy and population expanded dramatically, and it became the main railway hub and economic centre of Germany. Additional suburbs soon developed and increased the area and population of Berlin. In 1871, Berlin became the capital of the newly founded German Empire.

In 1933 the Nazi Party came to power. After the "Kristallnacht" pogrom in 1938, thousands of the city's Jews were imprisoned in the nearby Sachsenhausen concentration camp. Starting in 1943, many were shipped to death camps, such as Auschwitz.

During World War II, large parts of Berlin were destroyed by Allied air raids and the 1945 Battle of Berlin. Around 125,000 civilians were killed. After the end of WWII , by Berlin received large numbers of refugees from the Eastern provinces. The victorious powers divided the city into four sectors, analogous to the occupation zones into which Germany was divided. The sectors of the Western Allies formed West Berlin, while the Soviet sector formed East Berlin.

The Berlin Wall was a barrier that divided the city from 1961 to 1989, when it fell. In October 1990, the German reunification process was formally finished.
-

Potsdamer Platz (Potsdam Square) was a very bustling traffic intersection, that had the first traffic lights in the 1920s. It was the centre of Berlin and the heart of its nightlife. It had acquired an iconic status, just like Piccadilly Circus in London or Times Square in New York. The air raids during WWII turned the whole area into rubble and after the war, the American, British and Soviet Occupation Zones converged there, what made it to a centre of the "Black Market". With the construction of the Berlin Wall in 1961, the Potsdamer Platz now found itself physically divided in two. It became totally desolate.
The remaining damaged buildings were cleared. This was done on the eastern side, to give border guards a clear view and an uninterrupted line of fire. On the western side, an observation platform got erected for tourists to gaze over the Wall at the wilderness beyond. It was a huge, empty, dirty and very strange place.

When the Berlin Wall "fell" in November 1989, here the wall was breached to create a new border crossing. In July 1990 Roger Waters (Pink Floyd) performed with numerous artists "The Wall", to commemorate the fall of the Berlin Wall eight months earlier. The show had a sell-out crowd of over 350,000 people, but just before the concert to gates were opened to allow another 100.000 people in.

Then Potsdamer Platz developed Europe's largest building site, creating a cold, futuristic centre of commerce in the centre o Berlin. Part of this is the "Sony Center" that has an interesting dome construction over the large patio.