For forty years, a divided Germany was the frontier of a divided world.
The border between the two Germanys was the fissure between East and West, physically,
politically, and socially.
The Berlin Wall brutally enforced two competing and unequal ways of life, but the outrage
of 78 million Germans finally pushed the seemingly immovable world order aside with a momentum
that simply would not be stopped, short of a political miracle.
In October of 1990, the Eastern state was essentially absorbed into the West, and a
new Germany emerged.
International Video Network welcomes you on this video visits tour of Germany.
Today's Germany is defined by natural boundaries, to the North, the angry North Sea, and the
gentle Baltic, and to the South, the formidable Alps.
Germany meets Poland and Czechoslovakia in the East, and the mighty Rhine River flows
along Germany's western edge.
Germany's borders have meandered about the maps of Northern Europe over the centuries,
swelling and shrinking the fortunes and attitudes of a culture that was at once aggressive and
artistic, but never meek.
Though the former East Germany is only a third of the united country, it contained the nation's
heartland, historic towns and cities, the birthplace of ideas that changed the world.
In Germany's West, there are remarkable centers of industrial might, beautifully restored
cities and cultural wonders.
The cradle of German history lies here, where the rugged Alps give way to a more livable
scenery.
In this benign valley of Lake Constance, remnants of lake dwellings dating back to the Stone
Age have been found, built like these reconstructions on pilings to protect against man and beast.
Other tribes left rock-lined burial grounds in the northern part of what is now Germany,
on the heath south of Hamburg.
Around the time of Christ, the Romans pushed their empire to the Rhine and Danube, and
brought with them new levels of cultural sophistication.
Building technologies, like these house floors heated by hot water basements, were unknown
to the native Germanic tribes of the time.
Many Roman outposts, strategically located at river crossings and trade routes, eventually
grew into modern cities, which today carry names like Cologne, Mainz, Regensburg, Trier
and Vienna.
Ruins of castles, built a thousand years after the Romans, still dot the landscape in many
places.
They are powerful witnesses from Germany's distant past, when the far flung frontiers
of the Holy Roman Empire of the German nation had to be defended.
Medieval knights built sturdy castles on cliffs overlooking their lands to protect themselves
and their subjects.
From these high vantage points, the knights could spot wandering traders and collect a
toll from them.
With the waning of the Middle Ages, some knights turned into raiders, robbing trade caravans
and rich merchants, so townspeople began building their own fortifications for protection, just
as the knights of the castles had done before.
The marketplace, with the church and the Rathaus, or city hall, became the center of these developing
towns.
At first, regional markets were held only on religious holidays, but they soon developed
into weekly affairs and made the rising cities wealthy and independent.
To this day, markets are held in the shadow of the churches and cathedrals, providing
a gathering place and trading center for farmers, artisans and craftsmen.
In many German towns, the Middle Ages are still alive.
It's not a musty history, but a living presence with old traditions, not a dead museum, but
a dynamic world where people live and work, where the past is accepted as a natural component
of the present.
In these picturesque towns in the center of the country, the quaint live side by side
with the ordinary, and medieval houses have adapted to modern life.
It may look like a pop-up picture book, but is it likely to collapse like one?
Not a chance, says the head of the building department in Alsfeld.
The age of a house does not compromise safety at all.
Framed timber construction is so oversized, compared to what's really needed, that one
could safely remove half the timbers without weakening the structure.
Those crooked and slanted timbers you see on old houses were not that way originally.
They warped over the centuries.
Wood, after all, is a living material.
When we restore houses, we occasionally have to strip them down all the way to the basic
frame and repair it first, before we can start restoring the inside and the outside.
In the Middle Ages, and even into the Renaissance, people lived in a town that was surrounded
by a wall, so they couldn't just spread out as we would today.
You've seen how narrow the streets are, often no wider than two meters.
So in order to gain space on the inside of the houses, they made the upper story jut
out from the lower one.
Once they started building one story at a time, with the upper story resting on top
of the lower one, they could make the upper rooms larger.
That figure over there, on the corner of the marketplace, was carved right out of the structural
timber.
It's actually the statue of the mayor of the time.
That kind of decorative carving and ornamentation is very typical for houses built during the
Baroque period.
Timber frames were the predominant method of building for centuries, varied by local
conditions and customs.
In the north, brick is the common fill material for the space between the timbers.
For the picturesque roofs, slate and clay tile are most common, or thick and warm thatch
in northern Germany.
But nowhere do the thatch roofs look cozier than here in the Black Forest.
The German forests, and the Black Forest above all, are the stuff that fairy tales are made
of.
Tales of wolves and deer, of enchanted frogs and gnomes.
The sounds of this quiet forest come to the outside world on the wings of a cuckoo.
Ever since the 17th century, people here have been carvers.
Their mechanical cuckoo clocks caught the world's fancy.
Today, specialty shops build not only mass-produced clocks, but also remarkable handmade works
of kinetic art.
These dancing figures are not someone's romantic imagination of the past, but are much like
folk groups everywhere, especially here in cheerful and earthy Upper Bavaria, where Germans
and Austrians share a common heritage.
See?
These costumes also find their way into a specialty of this area, the painted house fronts.
Germans everywhere like to spruce up their houses with flower boxes in the windows,
but nowhere do people delight more in the house front frescoes called Lufthalmalerei than here in the Alps.
Sometimes it's hard to tell where three-dimensional reality ends and painted-on make-believe starts,
and the subjects are as endlessly imaginative as German fairy tales.
Perhaps it's something in the air of the Bavarian Alps that instills these gregarious people
with a flair for the imaginative and joyous arts.
The son of a man who painted many of these house paintings is a carver in his native Mittenwald.
Here, Stefan Feffer is in the process of transferring the shape of a small carved model
into a much larger wood sculpture, chiseling out its rough contours for carving.
Of all the crafts in Mittenwald, none is more famous than violin making.
Here, Germany's only violin-making school produces masters like Anton Mahler.
Like all masters, he started out by attending trade school for three and a half years,
then worked as a journeyman with another master for five years,
just as he now has a journeyman working with him.
Does he himself play the violin? Oh, sure, but he doesn't have enough time, he says.
Violin making is both an art and a craft. Anton Mahler explains why it takes 160 or 180 hours,
stretched over several months, to build one violin.
Building a violin involves a lot of different operations.
Every part starts out as a solid piece of wood, which is then worked down with finer and finer tools.
In the end, all you can use is a fine scraper and sandpaper.
One thing many people don't know is that a violin is curved not only on the outside, but on the inside as well.
You can see a good example here on this bottom for a viola.
It has to be thin to allow it to resonate, but just how thin is up to the judgment of the violin maker.
That's really what determines in the end whether the violin has good sound or not.
The neck, too, is made out of solid wood.
First, the contour is cut very accurately, and then the top and finally the scroll is carved out.
It looks like this, a roughed out one and a finished one.
The scroll is just for decoration. It's one of the few things that has little to do with the sound.
Anton Mahler builds it to be right, and he builds it to last.
This German attitude is deeply rooted in history and can be seen very well in Germany's architecture.
Styles of architecture, and especially churches, are mirrors of the consciousness of the people and of the church and state.
So often, they were one and the same.
In many cities today, the old churches are surrounded by a pedestrian zone, not only for shopping and strolling,
but also as a forum for colorful folk artists.
The Romanesque churches from around the year 1000 are the first specifically German in style.
They were built by imperial dynasties, like those of Charlemagne and Otto the Great.
In their squat massiveness, they are truly castles of God,
symbolic of an empire that derived most of its power and unity from Rome.
The limitations imposed by the technology of the time, like the thick walls, small windows, and rounded arches,
are skillfully used to proclaim the power and confidence of the time.
Initially, ceilings were flat with limited spans.
But when the cathedral in Speyer was built, invention of the barrel vaults made a much larger interior possible.
In 1080, King Henry IV initiated the rebuilding,
but he was excommunicated by the pope over the right to install bishops and abbots,
so he couldn't be buried in his own church.
Henry's son later won removal of the ban, and on the day of the king's burial in the crypt,
the son celebrated his success by granting the citizens of Speyer freedom from inheritance taxes and the right to mint money.
To this day, whenever a new bishop is elected to Speyer,
this huge ball in front of the cathedral is filled with wine for everybody.
The cathedral in Bamberg is very Romanesque in its basic compactness,
but the towers, built only a few years later, already show the influence of the Gothic, which was in full bloom in France at that time.
Gothic architecture didn't really gain ground in Germany
until the new middle class and the craft guilds became more influential in both financing and design.
With the pointed arches, Gothic forms allowed much greater freedom of construction,
making higher and roomier and more glorious buildings possible.
Windows became larger, and sunlight, filtered through stained glass, could stream between the slender pillars.
Bundled columns on the inside, soaring but strong, and seemingly weightless flying buttresses on the outside,
introduced an elegance to architecture that allowed the builder to express the essence of his medieval perception of the world.
Religious fervor inspired bold feats of technological pioneering,
and resulted in monuments both to God and to the human mind and hands.
The lacy openness of the tower of the Freiburg Cathedral is a particularly fine example of a daring design,
executed so well that it has withstood centuries of war, wind, and weather.
These soaring cathedrals were the link between the aspirations of the soul and daily life.
And even today, they rise high above the surrounding cityscapes,
timeless monuments to mankind's spiritual inspirations.
Vaulted ceilings with their keystones originally made Gothic buildings possible,
but as construction became routine, ceilings became more and more ornamental.
The influence of the Italian Renaissance slowly became felt.
Buildings in Germany, too, took on a more horizontal look,
but in general, the Renaissance never became a truly German art form.
The absolute monarchy and the age of reason gave birth to the Baroque.
The style of Louis XIV symbolized absolute power, which is why the German princes imitated it.
This style can best be seen in castles like Würzburg or Schwetzingen or Nymphenburg,
where the grandiose layouts display the unassailable power of this state.
Even unruly nature in the gardens was subordinated to its will and to reason.
The exuberant styles of the late Baroque and its outgrowth, the Rococo,
were tailor-made for the Catholic southern regions of Germany,
where the Reformation, with its emphasis on austerity and hard work,
wasn't sitting well with the people.
The ornate became playful and weightless.
Painting and sculpture flowed into each other like a stage set,
and symmetric roundness turned into light-hearted curves and counter curves.
The French Revolution put an abrupt end to that light-hearted art.
In the beginning of the 19th century, Germany rediscovered classic antiquity.
In Munich, King Ludwig I built a grand plaza in the Greek style.
It was this facelift that gave Munich the nickname Athens on the Isar.
Ludwig's grandson, Ludwig II, fled into an unreal world of romanticism
that revived a heroic Germanic past with medieval legends and myths.
Ludwig led a sheltered childhood in the lonely mountain castle Hohenschwangau.
When he was only 18 years old, he had to assume the responsibilities of a king.
The young monarch immediately alienated his ministers by summoning to his court
a man who had just been banned from Dresden for revolutionary activities, Richard Wagner.
With Wagner, he shared his dream of recreating the medieval world.
Across the valley from his childhood castle, he built Neuschwanstein,
his own vision of medieval splendor.
Perched on a granite rock, it was originally sketched by a theatrical set designer.
This castle has become the medieval castle in the imagination of children everywhere.
The castle took 18 years to build, but was never completed.
The throne remained empty.
Wagner finally became too much of a political embarrassment and had to leave Bavaria.
Both drew more and more into the solitude of his beloved mountains.
Riding his sleigh into the night, he himself became somewhat of a myth.
More than ever, he concentrated on building.
In a lovely valley near Oberammergau, he built Linderhof,
a small rococo cameo set in a narrow strip of formal French gardens.
The rest of the park was left natural, except for an artificial grotto,
complete with a fantasy lake and a lavishly ornamented boat.
It is said that on hot summer nights, the king smoked his hookah on this peacock throne
in the Moorish pavilion which he had acquired from the Paris exhibition.
The king's lavishness and eccentric lifestyle finally led to proceedings to have him declared insane.
In his final days, he was confined to Berg Castle on Lake Starnberg,
where he ultimately drowned under mysterious circumstances.
Only 50 years later, true madness would take over in Germany.
But the Nazi empire left no memorable architectural monuments.
What remains today of Hitler's attempt at grandeur,
like his bombastic rallying stand at Nuremberg,
is mostly left to be taken over by the more enduring and merciful forces of nature.
As for the rest of Nuremberg, the town is a prime example of the vitality
with which Germany has healed the massive wounds of war.
Not patched, but lovingly and painstakingly restored where respect for the past demanded it,
and newly and bonely built from the ground up where only rubble was left.
The artisan's courtyard blends beautifully into the old surroundings,
a living monument to Nuremberg's medieval past.
The town has been famous for centuries for crafts ranging from Gothic sculptures
to toys and pewterware, textiles, pottery, and in a very special way, leibkuchen.
Everybody, but everybody, loves Nuremberg gingerbread honey cakes.
Here baked the way they were in medieval times, in the same kind of oven,
and from the same ingredients.
The dough consists mainly of boiled honey, flour, candied citron, and spices.
No fats, eggs, or sugar are used.
Honey was the only sweetener in existence when these spice cakes first were made.
Fat was rare, so they used ground hazelnuts to keep the dough from sticking to the baking sheet.
There is a traditional pattern of citron and almonds
that goes on top before the sheets put into the wood-fired oven.
When it comes out, and while it's still warm, the whole sheet gets a glaze.
Finally, when it's lukewarm, it's cut and put into a box and probably eaten on the spot.
Germany is a paradise for anybody who loves the baker's art.
From dark to light breads, from cakes and pastries to rolls, cookies, and anything in between,
salty, spicy, or sweet, but always fresh and delicious.
But when it comes to sweets, nothing can compare with marzipan,
a traditional confection so delicious and popular
that it is shipped to all parts of the world from here in Lubeck.
In its basic form, marzipan has an extremely simple recipe, almond paste and sugar,
but the things made from it by skilled hands and skilled machines
border on the miraculous in their lifelike appearance.
Are you sure?
Yes, I'm sure.
Only by biting into this Bavarian
sausage called Weisswurst can one tell whether it's made from marzipan, which it is, or whether
it's the genuine article made from veal. Sausages are another German passion. They are everywhere,
fat and skinny, long and short, hot and cold, indoors and outdoors as a snack or a main meal.
Sausages traditionally are washed down with beer. It seems that every town in Germany,
north and south, east and west, has at least one local brewery. These small breweries, like
the one in Alsfeld, are the pride of their town. They don't produce huge quantities,
but their brewmasters take great pride in their know-how, the all-natural ingredients
and their product, and gladly show off their clean operations.
The world has one supreme celebration of beer. The locals in Munich call it De Wiesen, meaning
the meadow. The rest of the world calls it Oktoberfest. One has the feeling that the
year in Munich culminates in this heaven of the Bavarians, this most joyous, most colorful,
most lively of all folk festivals.
Horse-drawn beer carts take part in the colorful parade. They used to bring in all the beer.
The horse carts are no longer sufficient to handle the five million liters of beer needed
to satisfy the gusto of the six or seven million visitors, who also put away 76 whole spit-roasted
It's not all beer in roasted oxen and umpapa. Outside the beer halls, the meadow is lit
up with a dizzying assortment of traditional and high-tech rides and attractions. The child
and everybody can spin, tumble, and whirl late into the night.
No filters, no
No filter
In
a refreshing way, most of Munich dances to a unique melody that's just a little bit
out of tune with the rest of the world, a little bit quaint, a little bit like the figures
in its town hall glockenspiel.
Munich calls itself the metropolis with a heart, and that's how Munich wants to be perceived,
with the heart, with the senses, and with joy.
For all its happy disposition, Munich is a sophisticated metropolis with a glorious past,
a city that prides itself on being a cultural center, with architecture laid out on a grand
scale, and with fine shops and superb art museums.
Of all the museums in Munich, one is very special, the Deutsche Museum, the largest
hands-on technology museum in the world.
Just walking through its 30 main exhibits is a 10-mile hike.
It brings the natural sciences and technology right to the visitors' fingertips, from ancient
beginnings to visions of the future.
Who knows how many children first felt the wonder of discovery and the curiosity of inquiry
here in this place, and then grew up to be the leaders in German technology, building
products that are respected the world over for both their level of technical excellence
and their standard of quality.
Germany is a nation on the move.
The transportation system is extensive.
The famous Autobahn Highway is known to car lovers around the world from 1,000 car commercials.
There are no speed limits here.
High-speed trains slip through the countryside.
Frankfurt is an international air travel center and a hub for domestic flights.
It is about an hour flight from here to Berlin, and there is constant commuter service.
Until 1989, Berlin was like two sisters, raised in different foster homes.
The eastern half was apportioned to the Russians.
West Berlin, occupied by the Americans, British, and French at the end of World War II, was
nurtured by the combined wealth of the Allies.
The three sectors eventually became a bustling modern city, an island of free enterprise
surrounded by communist territory.
At its center is Kudamm, short for Herfurstendamm, the broad boulevard that was the hub of entertainment
in the Roaring Twenties.
It is lined with upscale stores, hotels, and restaurants.
The avenue is a showcase of western comfort and glamour.
People watching is a world-class sport here, as spectators lounge in the many cafes, nursing
one of the local beers.
But Berlin's difficult past is just up the street.
The east end of the Kudamm is anchored by the mighty tower of Kaser Wilhelm Church,
a memorial to the terrible destruction of World War II.
The ruins' imposing style and dimensions recalled the days of imperial grandeur when Berlin
was the capital of the Prussian Empire, ruled by the Hohenzollern dynasty.
It was built in the 1890s by Wilhelm II, Germany's last emperor.
He led the country into World War I, but was forced to abdicate at the war's end.
In contrast to the vibrant pace of life in West Berlin, next door, her estranged sister
lived in the shadows.
East Berlin was controlled by the Russians as World War II ended.
They established a starkly different social order.
More than 40 years of communism proved a hard taskmaster.
Better living conditions in the western zone led to a constant exodus from East Berlin.
It was embarrassing and a practical drain on the labor supply.
One night in August of 1961, the East Germans quietly began reinforcing a thin line of barbed
wire dividing the city.
The Berlin Wall came to symbolize a divided world, a no-man's land in the Cold War.
Checkpoint Charlie, a heavily guarded passageway between the East and West, was notorious in
the lore of spine-chilling spy stories, but just as the Wall kept East Berliners imprisoned,
it kept prosperity out.
In November of 1989, years of repressed rage finally exploded.
Angry hammer blows against the Wall reverberated into a mass movement.
As suddenly as it had gone up, the Wall finally began to crumble.
Wallpeckers, as they were called, chipped away at communism, and the communists, as
if wearily admitting failure, did not resist.
A museum exists near the point where Checkpoint Charlie used to be.
The Wall Museum exhibits all kinds of ingenious contraptions used in heroic attempts to escape
to the West, homemade airplanes, car seats hollowed out to hide a baby.
Some succeeded, but many failed.
One year after the hammers began to fall, an idea that might have seemed a laughable
pipe dream the year before came true.
Berlin became one city, and divided Germany was united once more.
The landmark Brandenburg Gate, a monumental row of columns with symbols of passage and
welcome, was bitterly ironic when it served as a Cold War barrier.
Now it is indeed a gate again, the portal to the heart of Berlin.
It was built in 1789, modeled after Athens propelia of the Parthenon.
As Germany reunified, the gate became a symbol of the country's restoration.
Its design proclaims the ideals of human freedom and dignity, prevalent during the years when
Berlin was the center of enlightenment in Europe.
Stretching out from the gate is the city's main artery, Unter den Linden.
It's a stately thoroughfare named for the double row of linden trees planted in 1647.
This is Berlin's avenue of history, lined with impressive civic buildings.
Some of the most dramatic moments in German history played out here.
Across the centuries, the matchless precision of the Prussian goose step echoed down the
boulevard.
In the mid-1700s, in the armies of Frederick the Great, he typified the Prussian spirit
that sought a rare balance of order and ideals.
In the 17th century, long wars had nearly bled his country to death, but eventually
Frederick was victorious.
His territory grew and he turned Prussia into the most progressive state in Europe.
The next century brought splendid parades of emperors, and finally there were the ruthless
Nazi marches, and then East German soldiers.
Before reunification, soldiers from the East German People's Army would perform the changing
of the guard in front of the Neue Wache.
The old uniforms are relics now, sold on the street as souvenirs.
On Unter den Linden stands the Palace of the Republic, once the home of East Germany's
Communist Party.
Known to be both the seat of government and culture, it remains as a center for the arts.
Berliners nicknamed the palace the Lamp Shop because of the rows and rows of lights inside.
In the spirit of play, the palace also houses another popular pastime, a bowling alley in
its basement.
The rumble of tumbling pins echoes up from the bowling alley in the basement below.
With reunification, there is a renewed pride in Berlin's historical perseverance in overcoming
the destruction of war.
Not far from the palace, the imposing but artistic Berliner Dome has again become a
favorite landmark.
Built around the turn of the century to be the emperor's church, its original purpose
was short-lived since Germany became a republic in 1919.
It seems miraculous that Berlin's oldest medieval church, the Nicolai Church, survived the perils
of history that was built like a fortress.
During the officially atheist communist rule, it was turned into a museum.
This area was the center of the old city, and with painstaking detail, the neighborhood
has been restored to its turn of the century appearance.
As in other neighborhoods, a corner pub is never very far away.
Nearby is the restored Platz der Akademie, Berlin's most beautiful square in the eyes
of many.
It is framed by an historic pair of domes.
Between them sits the proud National Theater.
It's a concert hall now.
Every city has a focal point.
In East Berlin, it was the Alexanderplatz.
Berliners simply call it Alex.
This part of town was virtually destroyed in the war, but it's not obvious now.
It's a popular place to gather for shopping and strolling.
The fountain here is a favorite meeting place, but the square's landmark is this television
tower.
A revolving restaurant 500 feet up used to provide the perfect vantage point for both
spies and wishful thinkers.
From here, you could see over the wall to the Forbidden West.
The two cities shared a common personality trait, a talent for survival.
History proves Berlin's tenacious zest for life.
The darker the night, the brighter the lights.
The paradox was never more comfortable than in Berlin in the 20s.
Marlene Dietrich's animal sexuality, Albert Einstein's intellect, Kurt Weill's music
or Bertolt Brecht's enormously successful three-penny opera.
Berlin in the 20s was above all a passionate city where lust and intellect tangled, reveled
and brooded.
The kinetic images of artists like Vasily Kandinsky, Max Beckman and others reflected
the times.
By the late 20s, Berlin was a madcap city too busy to sleep.
Behind the cabarets where biting satires were performed, the alleyways were littered with
empty champagne bottles.
But there was an edge of desperation to this fever.
The city's recklessness was fueled by political turbulence.
By the end of World War I, life in Berlin had been reduced to a kind of bare-boned bitterness.
A cohesive government was yet to emerge.
This was the time of the Weimar Republic, a fractious ill-fated attempt at democracy.
Fascists and communists battled on the back streets.
As Berlin tumbled into the 30s, powerful industrialists made millions while the unemployed begged
on street corners.
The underworld flourished.
Emerging out of this frenzy, one man saw that power could be seized by exploiting the ripe
anger and mistrust of the time.
With ruthlessness and guile, Adolf Hitler rose to the chancellorship and moved into
the Reichstag, forging on to become a total dictator.
No other building is as haunted by the tragic aspects of German history.
Built in the 1890s to house the German parliament, its very design proclaims the politics of
expansionism and a society dedicated to social hierarchy and military might.
But Prussian ambition paled beside Hitler's brutality.
In the 12 years he ruled from the Reichstag until the Russian army occupied the bombed
out building, tens of millions died.
One of them was Adolf Hitler.
He committed suicide in a nearby bunker.
20,000 Soviet soldiers died in the battle for Berlin alone.
A memorial to them stands near the Reichstag.
Soldiers have kept up an honorary guard since the end of the war.
The older generation remembers.
Women greatly outnumber men in Berlin and all of Germany.
But new generations are more carefree, perhaps not so burdened by history, their relaxed
postures a far cry from the more rigid ideals of the past.
But there are reminders everywhere.
Here at the Olympic Stadium, Hitler held court in 1936 before thousands of spectators.
He hoped to use the Olympic Games as a showcase for his theories about a master Aryan race.
The black American Jesse Owens shamed Hitler on his own playground.
Owens swept four gold medals and was the most memorable athlete of the Games.
The street leading to the stadium is now named for Jesse Owens.
Later on, East Germany continued the notion that success on the playing field indicated
ideological superiority as well.
While children in West Berlin enjoyed large Olympic pools for recreation, the more talented
of their counterparts in the East were trained in state-run schools.
And in fact, small East Germany began winning a disproportionate number of honors in international
competitions.
But the real East-West competition was a lot less sporting.
This memorial commemorates the remarkable Berlin airlift.
In 1948, the Soviets surrounded West Berlin, intending to choke it off from the West.
For 11 months, Allied pilots supplied and fed the city.
A quarter of a million flights brought in two million tons of goods.
Seventy-five airmen died before the Soviets entered their blockade and gave up the idea
of controlling all of Berlin.
The East German Republic was officially formed shortly afterwards.
West Berlin would continue to be a pressure point.
After the wall went up, John F. Kennedy came to Berlin to deliver a poignant message.
All free men, wherever they may live, are citizens of Berlin.
And therefore, as a free man, I take pride in the words, ich bin ein Berliner.
The United States president made that famous speech on June 26, 1963, in front of the town
hall in the Schöneberg district.
The Europa Center, a shiny shopping mall, sums up the advantages West Berliners enjoyed
as part of West Germany, even though the rest of that country was a hundred miles away.
A water clock several stories high mesmerizes shoppers.
This was the sort of atmosphere of plenty that so beckoned people from the East when
the wall was open.
Shopping standards for East Berliners were considerably more Spartan, and industry was
20 years behind the West.
Now, the much maligned autos made in the East with plastic bodies mingle with shiny Mercedes.
There is a good mass transit system, but traffic in the city has greatly increased since unification.
As the Schrei River runs through Berlin, it surrounds a large island of culture.
Five museums here date from the 19th century, a period when art was practically a religion.
The Pergamon Museum houses architectural wonders from early civilizations.
In fact, there are reminders around the city that aesthetic sensibilities have always been
appreciated.
These offer beautiful formal gardens and enchanting landmarks.
For example, Charlottenburg Castle, a 300-year-old summer residence for the royal family.
Obviously, the Prussian court was not so dedicated to rigid values that more graceful artistic
surroundings went unappreciated.
Berlin is alive around the clock.
It's just expected that residents and visitors in a truly cosmopolitan city should find a
meal and entertainment at their convenience.
Eating places and clubs stay open till morning, and buses run all night.
About 16 miles from Berlin is the handsome town of Potsdam.
It was Prussia's foremost garrison, but history remembers it as a more recent landmark.
Here in the Tudor-style country home known as the Sicilian Hope, the victors came to
divvy up a defeated Germany at the end of World War II.
Winston Churchill, Harry Truman, and Joseph Stalin met in 1945 and decreed the division
of Germany.
The Treaty of Potsdam was signed on this table.
It would turn out to be the blueprint for the Cold War.
Potsdam's other landmark is Frederick the Great's splendid Sanssouci Castle.
Built in 1745, it was a refuge for this lonely king who withdrew from the burdens of war
to his without-worry castle.
The surroundings reflect Frederick's love of art, music, and philosophy.
The king often entertained the French philosopher Voltaire with long evenings of lively conversation,
fine food, and flute music composed by Frederick himself.
In this land of harsh winters, Frederick discovered a way to grow fruits normally found in a sunny
Mediterranean climate.
Special niches were embedded in the hill under the castle's foundation.
Hidden behind glass doors grew citrus, grapevines, and fig trees.
Frederick's admiration of French culture is also reflected in the geometrical design of
Sanssouci Park.
There are surprises too, such as a delicate Chinese teahouse hidden among the chestnut
and beech trees, but this style of Chinese decoration came into fashion in the European
courts of the 18th century, even in austere Prussia.
The company of these delightful Chinese courtiers would surely have chased away Frederick's
worries.
Resplendent in gold, the pavilion is called Palace of the Sun.
The region that was the Republic of East Germany is beautiful and varied.
One treasure is the Baltic coast, a wild and lonely shore along much of the coastline.
Continuing the tradition of their ancestors, local people still coax their livelihoods
from the sea.
At the end of a hard day's work, stout men find shelter in the port of Sassnitz, a small
town on the island of Rügen.
I've been working here for three years.
There are easy and difficult hours.
It is harder in winter when there is snow and ice, and there are nice hours in the summer
when work is pleasant.
Gemütlichkeit, or comfort, is never very far away in Germany, and it means local beers
flowing from the tap and bountiful portions of traditional food.
One place serving up Gemütlichkeit is this pub in Rostock.
It is a lively meeting place and a kind of museum at the same time.
Intricately carved ship models line the walls and hang from the ceiling, homage to the port's
intimate bond with the sea.
Stout men have been sailing from this port for more than 700 years.
In the 13th century, it was part of the Hanse, a federation of seafaring and merchant towns
including Hamburg, Lubeck, and Gdansk.
This cooperation gave the towns protection and brought them trading prosperity.
Rostock's port is still the anchor of its economy.
It is the largest and busiest port on the German Baltic coast.
The center of the town is off limits to automobile traffic so that sightseers and shoppers can
leisurely wander about.
The university here is the oldest in Northern Europe, founded 50 years before Columbus reached
America.
A fountain of serenity gracefully honors the school's early patrons.
Not far from Rostock rests the resort town of Arnamunda, the kind of seaport that turns
to the water for fun instead of hard work.
A sheltered harbor for private boats, piers, and white sandy beaches makes this a favorite
leisure spot.
These traditional wicker shelters from sun and wind and the cares of life are found on
beaches all along the Baltic coast.
Further west, Kulangsborn is another such resort.
An old train station here keeps a bygone era alive.
The train still leaves every hour for nearby St. Dobran just as it has for many, many years.
It seems miraculous to find the monastery at St. Dobran standing just as it was in the
13th century.
It belonged to the ruling house of the Dukes of Mecklenburg and other royal owners throughout
the ages.
The brick Gothic style achieves a surprising delicacy.
The southern part of what was East Germany is more populated and industrial.
In the middle of Saxony and in the middle of Germany's artistic and cultural history
is Leipzig.
It was said in medieval Europe that all roads lead to Leipzig.
This city remains one of the most important commercial hubs in Central Europe.
But it is also the city of music and literature.
The first method of printing musical notation was invented here.
This is where the great composer Richard Wagner, whose proud marches are so identifiably German,
was born, and here also his first opera found an audience.
Leipzig's proud musical tradition lives on at the opera house on the Karl Marx plots.
Just across the square, the world-famous Gewandhaus Orchestra has performed since 1781.
Music
Leipzig has yet another musical shrine, the music created in the Tomas Kershach on Loving
Ears around the world.
Johann Sebastian Bach worked here as choirmaster for 27 years until his death in 1750.
He was also a teacher at the Boys College.
The incomparable composer is buried in the church.
The old rulers and great merchant families of Leipzig appreciated the finer things in
life.
The city was heavily bombed during the Second World War, but some examples of past glories
remain.
The charming Old Town Hall of 1556 with its Renaissance facade.
In 1900, a grand new town hall was built on the foundation of a medieval castle.
Both Romanesque and Renaissance, its eclectic style is reminiscent of Germany's early glory
under the Holy Roman Empire.
At the Madler Passage, Chopra's browse and style, our Bach's Keller, founded in 1525,
was made world famous as a setting in the epic drama Faust by the revered poet Johann
Goethe.
Mephistopheles speaks to Faust about the cellar's merrymakers.
Above all else, it seems to me, you need some jolly company to see life can be fun.
To say the least, the people here make every day a feast.
With little wit and boisterous noise, they dance and circle in their narrow trails like
kittens playing with their tails.
When hangovers don't vex these boys, and while their credit's holding out, they have no cares
and drink and shout.
As a student of law in Leipzig, Goethe frequented the Auerbach Keller.
He was apparently a somewhat wild young man.
There is more proof here that a good gathering place will never go out of style.
The Kaffeebaum is a bad place for a diet.
It's been serving up tasty traditional German fare since 1694.
Dumplings, potato croquettes, venison with forest berries.
The ghosts of some illustrious geniuses linger in this coffee house, Goethe, the composers
Wagner and Robert Schumann, and the dramatist Lessing.
One of the great turning points in religious history began in the town of Wittenberg, and
it began, as great events so often do, with one man questioning authority.
In 1517, a university monk posted 95 theses here on the doors of the Schlosskirche.
The monk was Martin Luther, and his notice invited debate on matters of Catholic Church
practices.
Luther explained the dilemma he felt as a clergyman.
Church doctrine had become so perverted that it was an obstacle to pure worship.
At last I began to understand that the justice of God is that by which the just man lives
by the gift of God.
The just man shall live by faith.
At this I felt myself to have been born again, and to have entered the gates of paradise
itself.
The church excommunicated Luther, but he was defiant.
The Reformation was set in motion, forever dividing Catholics and Protestants.
Luther is buried in a tomb near the altar of Wittenberg's castle church.
Many think of the German countryside as a landscape covered with black forests, where
characters from Brothers Grimm fairy tales hide.
The mysterious Harz Mountains fit that image as well as any place might.
The forests are dark and deep, rustic towns are nestled in long, narrow valleys.
Legend says that Brachen, the highest mountain in the range, was the meeting place not of
fairy tales, but of witches.
In the Harz Mountain foothills lies the town of Pettlenburg.
Still basking dreamily in the Middle Ages, it is famous for its timber frame houses dating
back to the 13th century.
Although spared the destruction of war, the town has not aged well.
But Pettlenburg is on the United Nations list of World Heritage Monuments, and restoration
is underway.
The small towns that dot the German countryside offer relaxing weekend diversions in the park.
It
wouldn't be the German countryside without castles.
Wartburg dates from the 11th century.
It is a German favorite, rich in legends about good and evil.
The countess Elizabeth, daughter of the king of Hungary, lived here.
A young widow, she dedicated her life to the sick and poor, and was canonized after her
early death in 1231.
Luther found asylum in the castle after being declared an outlaw.
He used his time here to translate the Bible from Greek into German.
Traditions are being revived in the market square.
Erfurt was a very important merchant and trading center in medieval Germany, as it was on the
Via Regia, an ancient Roman trade route.
In other words, it was a hotbed of free enterprise.
And immediately after the dissolution of East Germany, local entrepreneurs rediscovered
their roots.
Small private businesses sprouted up overnight.
Even Soviet army soldiers stationed in the former German Democratic Republic, and now
paid in German currency, joined the shoppers.
The spires of a hundred churches and monasteries once crowded Erfurt's skyline.
A good number of them survived the communist years, and the fine details of portal sculpture
are among the beautiful art treasures from its past.
A short distance away lies Weimar, the shrine of German classicism, and home of great German
minds, the poet Goethe and the philosopher and writer Friedrich Schiller.
A monument to these brilliant cultural heroes stands before the entrance to the National
Theater, where Goethe held the post of director.
Later on, composers Franz Liszt and Richard Strauss served as the theater's conductors.
The tradition of fine theater still flourishes, as seen in this performance of A Doll's House
by Norwegian dramatist Henrik Ibsen.
Goethe came to Weimar in 1775 to tutor a young duke.
With his arrival and later Schiller's, the town began its rise to cultural prominence.
The duke's castle still holds a grand art collection, including masterpieces by Dürer
and Kranoff.
Here too, the influence of Goethe is omnipresent.
Poet, critic, painter, journalist, statesman, a giant in world literature.
The private world of this Renaissance man comes alive in the home where he lived from
1782 until his death 50 years later.
It is tastefully decorated in the classicist style that was popular with the bourgeois
class.
At this desk, the great thinker worked till the early hours of the morning.
The table where he entertained guests is still here.
Goethe was fascinated with classical antiquity and Italian style.
He surrounded himself with these classical treasures.
Dürer's brilliant and prolific career was eclipsed by his premature death at age 46.
These costumes are from one of his most celebrated plays, Don Carlos.
Even though this area produced great cultural contributions to Western civilization, a memorial
to some of its worst atrocities stands close by.
This is the tragic irony of the nation, and in this region, the glory of the German spirit
and its most base barbarism are neighbors.
It is said that the red brilliance of the poppies around Buchenwald comes from the blood
of thousands of victims murdered in this concentration camp.
Larger than life-sized statues serve as a memorial, not to the dead, but to those who
survived the final solution.
Dürer's euphemism for genocide of political opponents, the physically imperfect, homosexuals,
gypsies, and mostly Jews.
Near the Czech border is the Zexaschur Schweiz, the Saxon Switzerland.
Dramatic rock formations, caves, waterfalls, and mysterious forests are among nature's
attractions here.
An inviting place for this open-air theater, a popular tradition in Germany.
Come.
On a mountain above the meandering Elbe River, the Körnigstein, or King's Stone, is perched.
The town is a completely fortified settlement that was never conquered.
The Saxon court wrote out many a crises here, protecting its treasures within these impregnable
walls.
In this region, porcelain was invented.
The story goes that August the Strong, King of Saxony, ordered an alchemist to concoct
a formula for gold.
He came up with porcelain instead, a fortuitous accident, as porcelain proved to be just as
valuable for the king.
In Meissen on the Elbe, August the Strong founded Europe's first porcelain factory in
the early 1700s.
Its blue and white onion pattern became a trademark known around the world.
Making porcelain is still a local art, requiring the same skillful handling of the powder's
wheel and the painter's brush.
The factory museum displays many precious pieces by its most famous artists.
Upstream is Dresden, the capital of Saxony.
Dresden lies midway between Berlin and Vienna, geographically and culturally.
Because of the city's legendary splendor, Dresden had earned the nickname the Florence
on the Elbe.
Then the bombs fell, but this time it was the Allies who performed the tragedy.
On the night of February 13, 1945, Allied air raids turned virtually the entire city
into a raging inferno.
35,000 people died.
Dresden's many great landmarks were reduced to ashes.
It took half a century, but thanks to local pride and painstaking restoration efforts,
some of old Dresden's uniqueness has been restored.
The pier along the river is called the Balcony of Europe.
Then, as now, it was a place to stroll, to see and be seen.
The cathedral, Hofkirche, typifies old Dresden's feudal splendor.
With its tower and many opulent details, this baroque church was one of the most distinct
buildings of 18th century Dresden.
The cathedral and the Grand Opera House dominated the city skyline.
Finally reopened in 1985, this magnificent building is a proud example of perfect restoration.
The famous Zwinga, meaning keep, is another phoenix risen from the ashes.
It has all the fine accoutrements a feudal lord of the 1700s could have commanded.
Fountains, statues celebrating feminine beauty, stunning vistas and lavish pavilions serve
as an entrance to its central court.
Golden eagles soar above the delicate dome.
Historically, Dresden was a culturally enlightened city.
Men of letters and science and the arts lived here.
A world famous art collection includes the Sistine Madonna by Raphael, the Turricchio's
portrait of a youth, Giorgione's slumbering Venus, and many from the Dutch school.
It almost perished in the war, but now Dresden has much to boast about.
And the same could be said many times over across all of Germany, a nation both overcoming
and building on its past.
The two faces of Germany pose side by side in its storeroom of history.
A delicate piece of painted porcelain rests beside a Prussian helmet.
A copy of Goethe's Faust sits beside Hitler's Mein Kampf.
Throughout recorded time, when profound changes altered the course of Western civilization,
this small nation has often been at the vortex, constantly confounding those who would predict
its future.
Just ask the families who were, but are no longer separated by the Berlin Wall.
When the Germans finally tore that symbol down, they turned around and sold chunks of
it as souvenirs.
They put pieces in museums, they pounded some of it into dust.
Good metaphors, all, for a nation physically and culturally at the crossroads of history.
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