Exploring Jewish Berlin

A 3 – 4 hour guided history tour exploring Jewish Berlin

Of Germany’s roughly 550,000 Jews in 1933, around one third of them lived in Berlin. This means, that Berlin used to have a very vibrant, very visible, Jewish community, especially since Jewish life in Berlin goes back centuries. For one, there were the Jewish families especially invited by the Great Elector to settle (and invest) in Berlin in the late 17th century. As a result, the first synagogue was built in 1714. Sadly, it no longer exists.

One of Berlin’s Jewish Community’s most significant member entered Berlin through the Rosenthaler City Gate in the early 18th century, Moses Mendelssohn. His influence not just on the German Jews and Berlin’s Jewish community, but on the intellectual life of Germany as a whole, was substantial.

During the outgoing 19th century so-called Eastern Jews began to settle in the Barn Quarter. They had fled programs in Russia and were on their way to board steamers in Hamburg to bring them to the US, but got stuck half-way in Berlin. The vast majority lived in abject poverty, worked as peddlers and street merchants.

With the Nazi-takeover Jewish life in Germany –  which had its heyday in the 1920s – came to a  rapid and tragic end. This meant that by the end of World War 2, Berlin’s Jewish community had shrunk to just a few thousand survivors. Many of them, understandably, chose to leave the country to make their –  new – home elsewhere.

Today’s situation is different as ,unbelievably, Germany now has the fastest growing Jewish community in Europe. With the Fall of The Wall, many Jews left the former USSR to make Germany their new home. There is also a substantial community of young Israelis, many of them Jewish, who settled in Berlin due to the city’s vibrant art scene, but also because the Berlin of today is such a diverse city where everyone can be what they want to be. To explore Jewish Berlin and Jewish life in Berlin over the centuries – this tour is for you!
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German Resistance 1933-45

A tour tracing some of the courageous resisters and helpers in Nazi Germany

During the 12 years of Nazi terror, more than 6 million Jews were murdered, half a million Sinti and Roma, around 20. 000 homosexuals, and many more. It is a well known fact that not enough Germans dared to speak up against the Nazi terror, sometimes for sheer fear of risking their own lives, sometimes because they felt that as long as it didn’t concern them there was no reason to do or say anything, and sometimes because they simply didn’t care or even quietly (and sometimes not so quietly) approved and willingly complied with the regime.

And yet, there was resistance, there were people who did care, there were people who put their own lives and those of their loved ones at risk, simply because they wanted to do the right thing: saving lives, toppling the regime. Many of these courageous resisters have since been included in Yad Vashem’s avenue of “The Righteous among the Nations”, but way too few people across the world have heard about them, let alone know their names, where they lived and operated from, and how exactly they resisted and helped. This tour is meant to remember them, honour them, and bring them back into our collective memory.
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World War 2 and Cold War Guided Walking Tour of Berlin:

A tour through Berlin’s tumultuous history of the past 200 years.

This popular guided history tour takes you through several hundred years of German history. The focus lies on the years between 1871 and 1961. Stops on this tour include Checkpoint Charlie, the Holocaust Memorial by Peter Eisenmann, the site of Adolf Hitler’s first (non-public) speech in Berlin and world-famous Checkpoint Charlie. Moreover, you will get to see the locations of Hitler’s New Chancellery and Führer Bunker, the former Ministry of Aviation (today: Germany’s Ministry of Finance) as well as the Topography of Terror. Also included are Potsdamer Platz, the Sony Center, as well as an early building by British-Iraqi architect Zaha Hadid. On request, I can also include the legendary Hansa Studios where David Bowie recorded his famous „Berlin Trilogy“. Your private guided history tour concludes at the Brandenburg Gate and, time permitting,  with a brief stop at the Reichstag Building, to day the seat of the German Parliament.

In just under three hours this guided history tour packs it all in. It gives you a quick, overall introduction to Berlin. Berlin, a city with a history that is as rich as it is troubled and tumultuous.
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Royal & Imperial Berlin Walking Tour

A guided history tour of Berlin under the rule of the Hohenzollern dynasty

The Hohenzollern were Prussia’s ruling dynasty ever since it turned from electorate to kingdom in 1701. Looking up to the French, everything that was created under their rule was modeled on their much envied French neighbors. But unlike the French kings, the Prussian kings were always short of cash. That is the reason why most of their palaces are slightly less opulent than their French counterparts.

Having said that, there was one, Frederick The Great, who ruled Prussia from 1740 to 1786. Frederick The Great was as cultured as he was a bit of war-monger. At any rate, money wasn’t quite so tight, enabling him to turn his vision for Berlin (and Potsdam) into reality. And so he  most definitely left his mark on both cities, never mind the fact that he, too, was very much in awe of what went on “outre-Rhin”. Under his reign, quite a few buildings were created which mark Berlin and its surroundings to this day. The State Opera, the Prince Heinrich Palais (now the Humboldt University) and, of course, Sans Souci Palace, are some of them.

But there is a lot more to be experienced on this tour. For instance, Gendarmenmarkt, the Barenboim-Said Academy, a row of buildings formerly owned by the Mendelssohn family, and so on, that make this guided history tour more than worth your while!
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The Berlin Wall: A Private Walking Tour Along The Wall Memorial

A unique guided history tour of the Berlin Wall Memorial

For 28 years, Berlin was divided by The Wall, referred to as Wall of Shame by the West and an Antifascist Protection by the East.

Hundreds of people lost their lives in their determination to flee the GDR’s totalitarian regime, be that through a tunnel, by balloon, by trying to swim across the river Spree, and so on.

The stories of flight are manifold. And so are the stories behind the creation of The Wall itself. This infamous structure didn’t just appear overnight but, in fact, was, well, a work in progress. It was constantly fortified and made ever more impenetrable. During your private guided tour with Berlin Tours, you will get all the details and background information. Not only on The Wall itself (or rather: the „four generations“ of it), but also on the perfidious system that kept The Wall going for 28 years.