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THE WALL
$1.25
Vol XCIII, No. 311
25th September, 2014
Going through the Wall
Freedom in Berlin
When TIME sent photographer Anthony Suau to cover the opening of the border between East and West Berlin in 1989,
he knew it could be
the story of a lifetime.
The Berlin Wall
The background
We talked to Joanna, Richard and Dieter about the fall of the Berlin Wall.
The Berlin Wall was built in 1961 to stop East Germans escaping from their communist country to the democratic West. In 1989, the communist governments in Eastern Europe were falling and on 9th November, East Berliners broke the barriers at the crossing points between East and West Berlin. In the twenty-eight years of the Wall, over 150 people were killed when they were trying to cross it.
I went to primary school in West Berlin. When the border was opened, our teacher took us to Checkpoint Charlie, a famous border crossing point. We gave flowers to the people who were crossing from the East. They hadn't seen their relatives for almost thirty years! A woman was crying - her brother had died trying to climb over the Wall.
Richard, UK
I arrived in West Berlin on 10th November. Poland had already chosen its democratic government. The atmosphere was amazing: people had come from all over Europe to celebrate. We cheered every East German car that came through the gate. But I remembered crossing that border before on the train to Paris - it had been very scary, with never-ending luggage checks, unfriendly soldiers and police dogs. And now, the people who had lived all their lives under tyranny were finally free.
Joanna, Poland
It was like a dream. The people who had demonstrated against the wall just a few days earlier were still in prison. And now, all the checkpoints were open. The dogs and armed soldiers had gone. We were knocking down the wall with all sorts of tools, even our bare hands. Ironically, it wasn't difficult to destroy: the communist builders hadn't used good quality materials to build it.
Dieter, Berlin