Berlin Wall fragment, Berlin, Germany, 1961

1989

The opening of the Berlin Wall by the East German government on November 9, 1989, signaled the collapse of Communism and led to the reunification of East and West Germany. Their separation through the center of Berlin dated to the Allied partition of the country into occupied zones after the Second World War. When the end came, portions of the wall were cut into memorial-size chunks of concrete. An apparently limitless supply of smaller bits became available to a global audience who had witnessed the wall’s destruction on television. A vendor in a Berlin flea market sold this fragment to a visiting Canadian student, who in turn sold it on an Internet auction site.