Listening station

This article is about a building in Berlin. For listening stations in general, see radio listening station .

This article or the following section is not adequately provided with supporting documents ( e.g. individual evidence ). Information without sufficient evidence could be removed soon. Please help Wikipedia by researching the information and including good evidence.

The sources given contain almost nothing. - Usteinhoff ( discUSsion ) 00:04, May 26, 2014 (CEST)

Listening station
View from the Neustadt church square
Data
place	Berlin ( Germany )
Coordinates	52 ° 31 '4.5 "  N , 13 ° 23' 8.6"  E Coordinates: 52 ° 31 '4.5 "  N , 13 ° 23' 8.6"  E
particularities
Former listening station opposite the former US embassy to the GDR

The corner building at Neustädtische Kirchstrasse 3 / Mittelstrasse 41/42 on Neustädtischer Kirchplatz in Berlin-Mitte was built in 1880. It is believed that between 1977 and 1989 the Ministry for State Security of the GDR operated an eavesdropping station from the building on the opposite side of the street for intelligence observation of the US embassy in the GDR, of which the eavesdropping system used at the time is still preserved. After the political upheaval in 1989/1990, the building remained unused for 24 years.

Telephone system on the ground floor of the listening station

chandelier

patio

history

owner

The corner property at Neustädtische Kirchstrasse 3 / Mittelstrasse No. 41 and No. 42 was still in different hands in 1799. It is located next to the properties at Unter den Linden 42 and Mittelstrasse 43, the former property of Wagons-Lits .

Distillery

The house at Mittelstrasse 42 was only two-story in 1799 and at that time it was occupied by the brandy distiller George Lemm as the owner. G. Lemm died in 1823 at the age of 89. His son Georg Friedrich Wilhelm Lemm continued the distillery. The members of the Lemm family earned their livelihood as spirits distillers and later as "distillers" with the production of spirits and rum. After the property was sold to the court pharmacist Dr. Knop, who also became the owners of the fuel factory, the Lemm family continued to live in the house until it was demolished in 1880. Thus, the Lemm family was connected to the old house at Mittelstrasse 42 for at least 80 years. In 1874 the banker Emanuel Lohnstein became the owner of the property at Mittelstrasse 42, the neighboring property No. 41 and, from 1882, the neighboring property at Neustädtische Kirchstrasse 3.

The new Building

Kommerzienrat Lohnstein, owner of a “banking, commission and forwarding business”, had the old houses in Mittelstrasse demolished in 1880 and a new building built on the 618 m² area. The new building was given the address Mittelstrasse 41/42 and Neustädtische Kirchstrasse 3. In 1883, a total of twelve tenants were registered in the new building, including the Berlin Brokers' Association, which in 1881 was one of the first Berlin telephone subscribers with the number 8. There were also three banking shops in the building and another distiller. At that time one of the banking houses belonged to Adolph Thiem , a stockbroker and one of the most important art collectors of the 19th century.

The corner property was taken over in 1918 by Lohnstein's heirs, who owned it until 1993. The four-storey house with a bay each facing Mittelstrasse and Neustädtische Kirchstrasse as well as a round bay window at the intersection survived the Second World War and has been preserved with a smoothly plastered facade after it was completely removed. After the Second World War, the building included a. "Riechel's Drogerie", a craft shop and, for a short time, the restaurant "Mittelklause". From 1965 to 1990 the East Berlin municipal tourism company “Berlin Information” and the Wohin in Berlin editorial office were located in the building.

From 1977 the neighboring former department store for the army and navy and later the House of Crafts served as the US embassy to the GDR. Since then, at the earliest, the corner house has apparently been used by the GDR Ministry for State Security for eavesdropping purposes, in order to monitor the embassy for intelligence services.

Current use of the building

The intelligence service surveillance of the embassy was discontinued after the political upheaval in 1989/1990, which meant that the building remained unused until 2013. It was opened to the public for the first time on August 27, 29 and 31, 2013 with the permanent performance “In search of the lost sound” with the artists Regina Schulte am Hülse, Nikolaus Neusser, Bernd Oezsezim, Malte Kebbel and Luise Czerwonatis made. In 2014 there were further performances under the direction of Regina Schulte am Hülse, in which the jazz musician Theo Jörgensmann , the DJ and producer Mike Vamp , and the visual artist Christian Korda also took part.

Currently (2019/2020) the building is being extensively refurbished for a new use. Café Einstein is located in the neighboring Pietzsch Unter den Linden 42 building, which was built between 1993 and 1995 .

literature

• Dagobert Hoebbel: Unter den Linden 40 - A piece of Berlin boulevard and its surroundings. Berlin Story Verlag, Berlin 2012, ISBN 978-3-86368-096-1 .
• When ruins sound again . In: BZ , September 2, 2013
• Joachim Staadt: Service at the diplomat - the surveillance of "privileged persons" in the GDR and the service office for foreign representations (DAV) , magazine of the research association SED state of the Free University of Berlin

Web links

Commons : Listening station  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

1. ^ Adolph Thiem, banking . In: Berliner Adreßbuch , 1881, part 1, p. 986.