Kreuzberged: Berlin Companion: Berlin Calendar: On This Day in Berlin

VICTORY OVER THE SCALY DEATH: FIRST SMALLPOX TRIAL VACCINATIONS IN BERLIN

Berlin Companion — Sun, 07 Jun 2026 13:21:19 GMT

It was feared, it was deadly, and it never failed to return. By the late eighteenth century each year in Europe, smallpox - a highly infectious and potentially lethal disease AND the only completely eradicated infectious disease in human history - killed some 400,000 people.

Inoculation hero Edward Jenner and two of his colleagues chasing off 18th-century anti-vaxxers. By Isaac Cruikshank, 1808. Via Wellcome Library, London CC-BY 4.0.

It did not leave anyone out, rich or poor: including Austrian emperor, king of Spain, Russian tsar, Swedish queen and a French monarch. At best it left its victims scarred for life (like Stalin, who contracted smallpox at the age of 7), or blind and/or deaf: Beethoven’s deafness is contributed to his contact with the disease.

Johannes Kepler’s vision was quite limited after at the age of four he suffered bout of smallpox himself - later he would lose his wife and one of three children to the disease.

For at its worst, the disease killed its victims after many days of vile suffering.

That’s why after in 1801 nearly 1,700 people died of Blattern (German name for Smallpox) in Berlin, on 7 June 1802, successful trial smallpox inoculations (carried out mostly on Berlin orphans) began…

BERLIN CALENDAR: LIGHT AND LIDO IN THE JUNGFERNHEIDE

Berlin Companion — Wed, 27 May 2026 08:32:40 GMT

The 1920s in Berlin - you can sum them up in one Charles Dickens quote: “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of light, it was the season of darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair.”

No other era in the city’s history was as tragic, yet as bright. The latter not only because of the incredible rise of commercial illumination (neon lights) and the abundance of entertainment.

Its brightness lay also in the pace at which social projects were voted for and actually realised. It was the time of new modern residential estates, of unheard of levels of investment in affordable housing, of new schools, new hospitals and new sports venues. It was also the time when some Berlin’s favourite public parks were created.

One of them, Volkspark Jungfernheide, opened on this day in 1923 - the year of the hyperinflation nadir.

Bears and Playing Children, two sculptures by Herman Pagels which used to flank the main alley at the park entrance. Only one of the bears survived the war (possibly stolen) but several years ago a replica was made. You will find them at the Kurt-Schumacher-Damm / Heckerdamm entrance today. Image via berlin.de.

Designed by the unsurpassed, ingenious garden architect and park designer, Erwin Barth, it was created within the old royal hunting grounds in the Jungfernheide woods. Today, at nearly 150 ha it is the second largest designed park in Berlin.

For us, living over a century later, it might be hard to imagine what wonders it offered to grown-ups and, first and foremost, children who lived in its vicinity. The park, stretching along a straight East-West axis, had not only green meadows and comfy benches in the shade of ancient trees (Barth’s design incorporated the already existing Jungfernheide woods).

Design drawing by Erwin Barth. From the collection of Berlin’s Architektur Museum TU.

Following the main principle of Gestaltung in the 1920s German social and public architecture - Licht, Luft und Sonne (Light, Fresh Air and Sunshine) - it also had several sports fields, playgrounds, an open-air “nature theatre” where the stage was a circular piece of lawn surrounded by seats and a tall lush hedge separating it form the comings and goings around it. You could circumvent the park following a four-kilometre-long circular path (next to dozens of smaller ones).

Children performing at the nature theatre in Jundfernheide Park in 1930, photographer NN, image via Bezirksamt Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf, berlin.de.

But first and foremost, it had a lido. The Jungfernheide Lido with a gorgeous sandy beach, marked bathing areas for the small and the older guests, with changing rooms, hygiene facilities and a restaurant.

A place which exists until today and can be easily reached from the city centre - with the U-Bahn.

Take any train on the line U7 (direction: Rathaus Spandau), leave the train at the station “Siemensdamm”, turn into Jungfernheideweg, walk past one of the most impressive 1920s Berlin residential estates, Siemensstadt, and you are there.

If you walk along the main axis of the park, at the other end of the small lake where the lido is located, you will find another, wild bathing spot (which is also free of charge).

The “wading pool” (for non-swimmers) at the Jungfernheide lido. Photo from the collection of the Architektur Museum Technische Universität zu Berlin.

On top of that today’s Jungfernheide offers a climbing park within the park, a beer garden, a café at the foot of the graceful 38-metre-tall water tower, and a petting zoo.

Berlin is full of enchanted places but its public parks must be its greatest treasure. Here is definitely one. And Erwin Barth, who - blind at the age of 53 - tragically, took his own life in July 1933, would have rejoiced knowing how popular and how frequented they still are in 2026.

By the way, if you ever wondered, why Jungfernheide is called “Maidens’ or Nuns’ Heath” (the heaths interspersed the spreading woods): this 1835 map of Jungfernheide with Nonnen Damm (now Nonnendamm) and Nonnen Wiesen - Nun Causeway and Nun Meadows - shows places whose names referred to the Benedictine convent from Spandow (original spelling of Spandau) and nuns who owned that land. Nonnendamm was a road from the said Spandow to Berlin-Cölln built with convent's money.

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BERLIN CALENDAR: BUILDING THE HEADLINE - FIRST POST-WW2 EDITION OF THE "BERLINER ZEITUNG"

Berlin Companion — Thu, 21 May 2026 11:55:13 GMT

Berliners with the first edition of the “Berliner Zeitung” photographed by Eva Kemlein on May 21, 1945. Image via Stadtmuseum Berlin.

What do you need most once the cannons go silent and life as it was can begin to recommence? Next to the obvious staples? Information. News about what is happening, whom to contact and what is even there. That is why in 1945 one of the paramount tasks of the new Berlin administration was to launch newspapers again. Their less overt aim? To spread new ideology: this time Communism.

On this day in 1945 Berliners, who had just emerged from the hell of the last battle for the city, could buy the first edition of a soon-to-be popular daily published in Berlin after the end of the Second World War…

BERLIN CALENDAR: HEADING FOR A FALL - BERLIN STOCK EXCHANGE CRASH OF 1927

Berlin Companion — Wed, 13 May 2026 11:57:24 GMT

Famous thinker once said: “Everyone has a plan, until they get punched in the mouth”. You might know Mike Tyson through his other career - as a boxer - but when the man was right, he was right. His boisterous statement can be applied to a great number of situations - including to what happened on this day in 1927 in Berlin.

On May 13, 1927 Berlin Stock Exchange saw the value of its shares and stocks plummet from 204 to 136 points - a drop of 31.9%. The crash which happened on, nomen is omen, Friday the 13th, went down in history as Black Friday…

BERLIN CALENDAR: THE PIOUS AND THE RUBBER GOODS

Berlin Companion — Tue, 12 May 2026 07:28:15 GMT

On 12 May, 1945 Julius Fromm (born as Israel From), inventor of the first seamless rubber condom, died in exile in London at 62. "Fromms Act" or "Frommsen" were produced in Berlin from 1916 and would be included in every German First World War soldier's pack. By 1919 some 150,000 Frommsen were manufactured per day. Here’s Herr Fromm’s seamless road to success…

THE KAISER AND THE MAN WITH THE CAMERA: OSKAR MESSTER FILMS WILHELM ZWO

Berlin Companion — Mon, 04 May 2026 08:38:08 GMT

On this day in 1897 in Stettin (now Szczecin in Poland) a Berlin filmmaker, inventor and, for many, the legitimate father of German cinema industry, Oskar Messter, became the first person ever to have captured Kaiser Wilhelm II on film. It would be the beginning of a beautiful friendship…

Still from Oskar Messter’s film. Via Europeana.eu.

STEEL JACKET BEAR BLEEDING

Berlin Companion — Tue, 28 Apr 2026 12:37:12 GMT

On this day in 1945, the Red Army units arriving from the south reached Hallesches Tor and what used to Belle-Alliance-Platz in Berlin-Kreuzberg. Steadily nearing Berlin’s “Heart of Darkness” - the government district around Wilhelmstraße and the New Chancellery - they almost immediately began moving north towards the legendary railway station, Anhalter Bahnhof. Berlin clocks were about to strike Zero Hour...

Aerial photo of Belle-Alliance-Platz (the round plaza replaced by today’s Mehringplatz), Belle-Alliance-Brücke (replaced by Hallesche Brücke) and Hallesches Tor area just north of the bridge where the historic city gate once was, with the elevated U-Bahn station between them. Photo by Walter Mittelholzer via ETH Library Zurich, Image Archive / LBS_MH02-15-0013

BAA BAA EAST BERLIN: FLOCKING TO THE WEST

Berlin Companion — Thu, 23 Apr 2026 09:12:06 GMT

On this day in 1961 one man and 600 sheep illicitly yet in broad daylight crossed the border between East Berlin / East Germany and the Western-Allies controlled West Berlin. At the same time, the shepard’s pregnant wife and his apprentice undertook a separate flight attempt, which - to save you the suspense - was successful, too…

GOOD BYE MEISTER: HEINRICH VON STEPHAN IS DEAD

Berlin Companion — Wed, 08 Apr 2026 15:53:52 GMT

On this day in 1897 Germany lost one of its most prominent reformers: Imperial Postmaster General, Heinrich von Stephan.

Portrait of Heinrich von Stephan by Georg Barlösius. Via Museumsstiftung Post und Telekommunikation.

Von Stephan’s name might not ring many bells today, but the man was a household brand in the second half of the nineteenth century. And not without a reason…

He was actively involved in the development of pneumatic post, almost singlehandedly pioneered the introduction of the postcard (he is often called its inventor but one should always remember that no invention has just one father/morher); he was the main power behind the establishing of Berlin’s first telephone network as well as the standardisation of postage prices, also worldwide.

GRENOUILLE A LA BERLINOISE or BERLIN HUNGER GAMES

Berlin Companion — Sun, 05 Apr 2026 15:14:43 GMT

On this day in 1945 the Berlin NSDAP Office for Public Nutrition launched new emergency guidelines - necessary in the view of the catastrophic supply situation of the Berlin population.

On top of everything else (meaning the city in ruins, the Red Army practically ante portas and the Nazi-in-Chief, Adolf Hitler, hiding in his bunker since January that year together with many of his closest helpers and supporters), Berlin was witnessing recurring bouts of both foot and mouth disease among its remaining cattle, hog cholera among its pigs and various unpleasant viral infections of its remaining horses.

The frightening prospect of famine could no longer be ignored…

ROUND AND UP AND ROUND AND DOWN: SCHÖNEBERG'S PATERNOSTER CIRCLE

Berlin Companion — Wed, 25 Mar 2026 16:30:51 GMT

On March 25, 1914 the city of Schöneberg (it would become incorporated into Berlin only six years later) celebrated the first meeting of its city council. A very special occasion, indeed: the meeting was held in the new city hall - the now famous (thanks to History and film-making) Rathaus Schöneberg…

FIRE AND FURY: THE BURNING OF 'DEGENERATE ART' IN BERLIN-KREUZBERG

Berlin Companion — Fri, 20 Mar 2026 14:50:29 GMT

On March 20, 1939 in Berlin some 5,000 artworks stamped off by the Nazis as Entartete Kunst - "degenerate art" - are said to have been set on fire and burnt1 in the courtyard of Berlin’s Main Fire Station in Lindenstraße 40/41 in Berlin-Kreuzberg.

The caution is necessary as - unlike with the book burning of May 1933 - hardly any physical evidence exists today proving the fate of the artworks. Could some of them have been appropriated by high-rank Nazi officials? Quite possibly. Could all of them have been thrown into flames? This, too, is a strong option so both are uncertain.

What is certain, however, is the will of the Third Reich to annihilate everything that did not fall into the party line. Including the artists themselves…

SEEING A FOREST THROUGH A TREE: TIERGARTEN RELOADED

Berlin Companion — Tue, 17 Mar 2026 18:31:02 GMT

Aerial photo of the park and its surroundings (Hansaviertel to the left) taken in autumn of 1945 by Hein Gorny and Adolph C. Byers.

On March 17, 1949 the first Governing Mayor of West Berlin, Ernst Reuter (the one of the eponymous "Ihr Völker der Welt, schaut auf diese Stadt!" speech) planted the very first gifted tree sapling in the nearly completely de-forested Berlin’s Tiergarten.

SIEGFRIED MAYER GETS ON BOARD: THE 1908 KAISERFAHRT

Berlin Companion — Mon, 16 Mar 2026 05:45:37 GMT

On this day, March 16, 1908, German monarch, Kaiser Wilhelm II (sometimes also jokingly referred to “Siegfried Mayer” or SM, for Seine Majestät), boarded a train of Berlin’s partly-elevated-partly-underground city railway. Event though the railway opened in 1902, it took Wilhelm Zwo six years to warm up to the idea of actually going on board…

MAYORS (ON) LEAVE - TERROR BEGINS

Berlin Companion — Thu, 12 Mar 2026 11:16:37 GMT

The Vossiche Zeitung - or Tante Voss (Auntie Voss) as it was lovingly referred to - was one of Berlin’s oldest and leading newspapers. Directed first and foremost at safely middle-class liberals, it was nevertheless read by all - the paper’s reliability and thoroughness exemplified high professional standards and made it trustworthy as a source.

So when on 13 March, 1933 a small and seemingly rather inconsequential little note appeared in its afternoon edition, informing the readers that several of Berlin’s borough mayors and city councillors had just “gone on a 14-day-long leave from work”, the news could have sunk in without leaving much ripple. Some of them would not be returning to their posts, the note said. The text named:

Mayor of Lichtenberg, (Alfred) Siggel
Mayor of Weißensee, (Emil) Pfannkuch
Deputy Mayor of Weißensee, Councillor Reimann
Mayor of Kreuzberg, (Carl) Herz
Mayor of Wedding, (Carl) Leid
Mayor of Prenzlauer Berg, (Otto) Ostrowski.

But there was more to that note than it appeared to the eye. This was no coincidence. All these men had one thing in common: they no longer fitted into the new political landscape. Or, to put it crudely: the Nazis hated them…

BERLIN CALENDAR: HOPPE-HOPPE-GARTEN

Berlin Companion — Sat, 17 May 2025 21:41:53 GMT

Should you be travelling in time today and wishing to meet Prussian monarch who in three years would become the first German Kaiser, it is Hoppengarten you should land at.

On 17 May, 1868 soon-to-be world-famous racecourse Dahlwitz-Hoppegarten opened in the presence of King Wilhelm I and his overwhelming Prime Minister, Otto von Bismarck (and overwhelming he was, as Wilhelm later admitted: “It’s not easy being a Kaiser under Bismarck…”)…

ROADS TO KING'S HEART: FRIEDRICH-WILHELM-STADT

Berlin Companion — Wed, 16 Apr 2025 21:41:02 GMT

Friedrich-Wilhelm-Stadt with the streets named after four royals and one wealthy Berliner - map of the city in 1875. Image in public domain via Wikipedia.

On this day in 1827 several streets in a new Berlin district - Friedrich-Wilhelm-Stadt - were given their proper names: Karlstraße, Albrechtstraße, Luisenstraße, Marienstraße and Schumannstraße. But for the first one they still bear those names. In 1947, two years after the war ended, Karlstraße became Reinhardtstraße to honour Max Reinhardt, widely known and respected theatre director who owned and/or ran several great Berlin theatres in the area.

What Karl, Albrecht, Luise and Marie have in common is their genes: the first three were royal princes and princess - three of out ten (!) younger children of Prussian King Friedrich Wilhelm III and his remarkably popular (for a Prussian monarch at least) wife Luise.

As for Marie, or Maria Luise Alexandrina Princess of Saxony-Weimar-Eisenach, the well-read and even better educated young woman from one of the most liberal and cultivated German courts (that of Weimar - which Goethe approved), she joined the band by marrying Karl of Prussia. Unusually for the time and the sphere, the two actually married for love - but you might want to have a quick look at the story of their pre-marital tribulations. It leaves the likes of Barbara Cartland wondering whether their own plots do have enough oomph.

But back to Friedrich-Wilhelm-Stadt and the streets named on 16 April, 1827: now we know of the royal sprogs but who, bitte schön, was Herr Schumann immortalised in the fifth road’s name?…