First erected in 1961, the Berlin Wall was more than 140 kilometers in length. It snaked across the city dividing it into West and East sectors. At first, the Wall was a wire fence that was progressively enhanced to become a 3.6 metre high solid concrete barrier. Parallel to the Wall on the East side was a heavily patrolled barren strip of land 100 metres wide. This strip became known as the Death Strip. During the Wall's 28-years of operation around 5,000 people managed to successfully defect from East to West Berlin, but there were many who were either captured or killed in the process.
The Wall dominated Berlin life every day through to its historic fall in November 1989. The significance of this event did not just liberate the people of East Berlin, it also liberated all of the former Soviet dominated German territories. German unification quickly followed and Berlin once again resumed its role as the political capital of the German Republic.
Nowadays, the Wall exists only as a line of bricks set into the ground. Bricks silently marking the Wall's former position. Then of course there is a variety of memorabilia sold by street vendors. Less than a year after the Berlin Wall fell pop artists from around the world performed a memorable concert in Berlin at Potsdamer Platz. The significance of this concert lives on today with the Roger Waters rendition of Pink Floyd's album "The Wall". Just like Berlin's line of bricks in the ground this great piece of music also lives-on as Wall memorabilia.....!
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