The 35th Anniversary of The Fall of The Berlin Wall on 9 November 1989

The Berlin Wall came to symbolize the Cold War’s division of East from West Germany and of eastern from western Europe. About 5,000 East Germans managed to cross the Berlin Wall (by various means) and reach West Berlin safely, while another 5,000 were captured by East German authorities in the attempt and 191 more were killed during the actual crossing of the wall.

East Germany’s hard-line communist leadership was forced from power in October 1989 during the wave of democratization that swept through eastern Europe. On November 9 the East German government opened the country’s borders with West Germany (including West Berlin), and openings were made in the Berlin Wall through which East Germans could travel freely to the West. The wall henceforth ceased to function as a political barrier between East and West Germany.

• Encyclopædia Britannica. (n.d.). Berlin Wall. Britannica Academic.

Print books:

1. Freedman, L. (2000). Kennedy’s wars: Berlin, Cuba, Laos, and Vietnam. Oxford University Press. E841 .F69 2000
2. Geipel, I. (2024). Behind the wall: my brother, my family and hatred in east Germany. Cambridge, UK: Polity Press. PT2667.E457 Z46 2024
3. Harrison, H. (2019). After the Berlin Wall: memory and the making of the new Germany, 1989 to the present. Cambridge University Press. DD290.24 .H37 2019
4. Heneghan, T. (2000). Unchained eagle, Germany after the war. London UK: Reuters. DD881 .H465 2000
5. Hilton, C. (2001). The wall: the people’s story. Gloucestershire UK: Sutton Publishing Ltd. DD881 .H54 2001
6. McKay, S. (2022). Berlin: life and death in the city at the center of the world. New York: St. Martin’s Press. DD879 .M35 2022
7. Meyer, M. (2009). The year that changed the world: the untold story behind the fall of the Berlin Wall. New York: Scribner. DJK50 .M49 2009
8. Pleshakov, K. (2009). There is no freedom without bread!: 1989 and the civil war that brought down communism. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux. DJK50 .P59 2009
9. Sarotte, M. E. (2014). The collapse: the accidental opening of the Berlin Wall. New York: Basic Books. DD881 .S215 2014
10. Taylor, F. (2007). The Berlin Wall: a world divided, 1961-1989. New York: HarperCollins. DD881 .T39 2007

When off campus, please enter your credentials to access e-books.

E-Books:

1. Claudia Mesch. (2008). Modern Art at the Berlin Wall: Demarcating Culture in the Cold War Germanys (Vol. 00003). I.B. Tauris. EBSCOhost.
2. Kilpatrick, A. (2020). After the Berlin Wall: A History of the EBRD, Volume 1. Central European University Press. Jstor.
3. Manghani, S. (2008). Image critique and the fall of the berlin wall. Intellect, Limited. ProQuest Central.
4. Schweizer, P. (2019). The fall of the berlin wall: Reassessing the causes and consequences of the end of the cold war. Hoover Institution Press. ProQuest Central.
5. Smyser, W. R. (2009). Kennedy and the berlin wall. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Incorporated. ProQuest Central.