Ode to Freedom

 It was on Nov 9, 1989 that the Berlin Wall came down in Germany. After World War II, Germany was divided into four parts, each occupied by one of the major Allied powers — France, England, the United States, and the Soviet Union. It didn't take long for relations between the Soviet Union and the other Allies to deteriorate, at which point the Soviet portion became East Germany, and the rest became West Germany. Berlin was also controlled by all four powers, so it was divided similarly to the rest of the country — into East and West Berlin — even though it was entirely surrounded by East Germany.

To stop refugees from fleeing to the West, the East Germans built a barbed-wire fence and established checkpoints along the border between East and West Germany. However, for a long time there was no physical barrier between the two halves of Berlin, so refugees went from East to West Berlin — and from there, to the rest of Western Europe. By 1961, more than 3.5 million East Germans had fled — more than 20 percent of the entire population. So the East Germans decided to put up a wall in the city. They began construction in the middle of the night and surrounded West Berlin. For 28 years, the Berlin Wall stopped emigration from the Eastern Bloc to Western Europe. Many people were killed trying to cross.

In the late 1980s, things changed. With Mikhail Gorbachev at the helm, the Soviet Union became more liberal. In 1989, Poland had the first free elections in the Eastern Bloc, and the Communists lost. That fall, Hungary opened its border with Austria. On November 4th, more than half a million protestors turned out in East Berlin, chanting Wir sind das Volk — "We are the people" — and demanding reforms.

November 9th, 1989, was a gray, cold Thursday in Berlin. East German officials made a last-minute decision to loosen travel restrictions for their citizens, hoping to quiet the unrest. An official named Günter Schabowski was in charge of giving regular press conferences for the government, and right before the press conference, he was handed a note with the news that East Berliners would be allowed to cross to West Berlin if they had permission. He didn't know anything else about it, so he just read the note aloud. When a journalist asked him when the order would take effect, he had no idea, but after a hesitation, he mumbled his best guess: that it would take effect immediately.

Schabowski's press conference was broadcast on all the nightly news channels, with news anchors declaring triumphantly that safe passage was now open between the two sides. Thousands of East Berliners thronged to the wall, demanding to be let through. Television crews covered the activity live, bringing even more people out on the streets. Frantic and confused border guards kept trying to telephone their superiors, but no official wanted to be responsible for issuing an order to open fire; meanwhile, the crowds were growing larger. Finally, the guards had no choice but to let the mob through. West Berliners had also heard the news on television, and there were crowds waiting on the west side of the wall with cheers and champagne. Restaurants offered East Berliners free meals, a soccer club gave out free tickets to their game, and individual West Berliners called their local TV station with offers of free lodging, beds, and theater tickets. The West German government gave East Germans "greeting money," about $55 to spend as they chose in the much-wealthier West.

In the days that followed, Germans from both sides tore down the wall with hammers, pickaxes, and screwdrivers. The East German government announced that it would be opening 10 new border crossings, and army bulldozers drilled into the wall to create them. Although they were technically creating new crossings, not tearing down the wall, the general consensus was that the wall was crumbling. Crowds waited for hours for the bulldozers, and then showered the drivers with flowers before picking up pieces of the wall as souvenirs. The East German protest chant of Wir sind das Volk, — "We are the people" — was changed to Wir sind ein Volk — "We are one people."

On Christmas morning of 1989, six weeks after the opening of the Berlin Wall, 71-year-old Leonard Bernstein conducted a performance in Berlin of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, with the words "Ode to Joy" changed to "Ode to Freedom." His orchestra and choir were made up of citizens from East and West Germany, France, the Soviet Union, England, and the United States. It was the first Christmas in decades that East and West Berliners could cross freely between the sides of the city, and many did so that day, waiting in lines for hours to get across. East Berliners enjoyed sausages from street vendors in West Berlin, while West Berliners packed into shops and restaurants on East Berlin's most famous street, Unter den Linden.