On November 10, 1989, Germans began tearing down the Berlin Wall following its premature opening the evening before. The Berlin Wall, Berliner Mauer in German, was a guarded concrete barrier that physically and ideologically divided Berlin from 1961 to 1989. Constructed by the German Democratic Republic (GDR, East Germany), starting in the dead of night on August 13, 1961, the Wall cut off (by land) … Continue reading Tearing Down That Wall
On April 29, 1945, Führer and Reich Chancellor (Reichskanzler) of the German Third Reich Adolf Hitler married his longtime partner Eva Anna Paula Braun in the Führerbunker air raid shelter in Berlin. Designating Admiral Karl Dönitz as his successor, on the following day Hitler killed himself by gunshot while Braun committed suicide with him by taking cyanide. In accordance with Hitler’s prior written and verbal instructions, that afternoon their … Continue reading Eva Braun, the Führerbunker & Hitler’s Marriage
Sometime in my early teens, my father gave me a book by Peter Tompkins called Secrets of the Great Pyramid. At the time I had a great interest in tunnels, caves and other “hidden” places and Tompkins’ maps and details of the passageways inside utterly fascinated me. I soon found myself studying Egyptology which eventually led to studies in Archaeology at Kansas State University and the University … Continue reading Queen Nefertiti and her Famous Bust
The German reunification (Deutsche Wiedervereinigung) was the process in 1990 in which the German Democratic Republic (GDR/East Germany) joined the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG/West Germany) to form the reunited nation of Germany, and when Berlin reunited into a single city, as provided by its then Grundgesetz constitution Article 23. The end of the unification process is officially referred to as German unity (Deutsche Einheit), … Continue reading Germany [Reunification] #2441A (2007)
![Germany [Democratic Republic] #91 (1951)](https://stampaday.files.wordpress.com/2017/01/germany-democratic-republic-91-1951.jpg?w=870&h=773&crop=1)
East Germany, formally the German Democratic Republic or GDR (Deutsche Demokratische Republik), was an Eastern Bloc state during the Cold War period. From 1949 to 1990, it administered the region of Germany that was occupied by Soviet forces at the end of World War II — the Soviet Occupation Zone of the Potsdam Agreement, bounded on the east by the Oder–Neisse line. The Soviet zone … Continue reading Germany [Democratic Republic] #91 (1951)
![Germany [West Berlin] #9N212 (1964)](https://stampaday.files.wordpress.com/2017/01/berlin-9n212-1964.jpg?w=840&h=695&crop=1)
West Berlin was a city that existed in the period between the end of the Berlin Blockade on May 12, 1949, to German reunification on October 3, 1990, as a political enclave surrounded by East Berlin and East Germany. It was 100 miles (161 kilometres) east of the Inner German border and only accessible by land from West Germany by narrow rail and highway corridors. … Continue reading Germany [West Berlin] #9N201 (1962)
![Germany [Allied Occupation] #583 (1948)](https://stampaday.files.wordpress.com/2017/01/germany-583-1948.jpg?w=870&h=773&crop=1)
Upon the defeat of Nazi Germany in World War II, the victorious Allied powers asserted their authority over all territory of the German Reich which lay west of the Oder–Neisse line, having formally abolished the government of Adolf Hitler. The four powers divided Germany into four occupation zones for administrative purposes, into what is collectively known now as Allied-occupied Germany (Alliierten-besetztes Deutschland). The occupation resulted in … Continue reading Germany [Allied Occupation] #583 (1948)
A Stamp A Day 