When we hear the stories of Berlin wall, we don’t often realize that basically the dimensions weren’t that great, and it is often forgotten that it was actually West Berlin that was surrounded by the wall and not East Berlin.
The height of the wall was 3.6 Metres (11.8ft). On August 13 1961 the works to build the wall started.
In November 1989 the wall came down. So for 28 years the people from Berlin were divided by a 3.6m high wall. The collapse of the Eastern European communist regimes didn’t start in Germany though.
In May 1989 the Hungarian government began dismantling the electrified fence along its border with Austria (with Western TV crews present).
in September, more than 13,000 East German tourists escaped through Hungary to Austria.This set up a chain of events. The Hungarians prevented many more East Germans from crossing the border and returned them to Budapest. These East Germans flooded the West German embassy and refused to return to East Germany.
Below are some pictures of the events of late 1989 when the people from East Berlin were finally free again to travel to the west which eventually resulted in Germany to be re-united and Berlin to become one city again.
People crossing Bronholmer Road to get to West Berlin.
By the time this photo was taken, the Soviet Ministry had already given out 10 million visas for travel and 17,500 permits to permanently emigrate from East Berlin.
A line of thousands make their way toward the Berlin Wall, ready to leave East Berlin.
East German ruling party spokesman Günter Schabowski announces that people can pass freely across the Berlin Wall.
Berlin. November 9, 1989
A worker tearing down a statue of Vladimir Lenin sneaks in a quick kick to its head.
Berlin, Germany. November 13, 1991.
Crowds in East Berlin help one another climb over the Berlin Wall and into the freedom of West Berlin.
November 1989.
