Bunker Museum Hagen

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Bunker Museum Hagen / Bergstraßen Bunker
Bunker exterior view.jpg

Entrance area of ​​the Hagen Bunker Museum in Bergstrasse 98.
Data
place Hagen ( North Rhine-Westphalia )
Art
architect Phillipp Röll
opening 2013
operator
Michaela and Gottfried Beiderbeck
management
Michaela and Gottfried Beiderbeck
Website

The Hagen Bunker Museum is located in the basement of a high bunker in Hagen in North Rhine-Westphalia and was opened in 2013.

The private museum is financed through entrance fees.

history

At the beginning of the Second World War, Hagen was an important railway junction and armaments industry town with around 150,000 inhabitants (1939). Around 72% of the city was destroyed by bombing raids by 1945. On October 1, 1943, 229 four-engine Lancaster bombers of the Royal Air Force flew the first of four major major attacks on the city. By April 14, 1945, when the Allies marched into Hagen, 2,161 of 11036 buildings were completely destroyed, 1,418 heavily, 548 moderately and 1,184 slightly damaged. The degree of destruction of the city center was almost 100%. The available living space was reduced from 15 m² per capita (1939) to 3.9 m².

The bunker was not only used as a shelter during the attacks, but due to the massive destruction of the city of Hagen from 1943 onwards, it could also be rented as a so-called sleeping bunker with small chambers measuring 2 × 3 m for one family each. After the war, the bunker was used as an emergency shelter for those who had been bombed out. Since 1948 the concrete block, although it has no windows to this day, has been a hotel ( Hotel Stadt Hagen ) with the Jägers Gute Stuben bar, which is very famous in Hagen . It also served as a warehouse for bombed-out shops, housed the premises of the Ebbinghaus driving school, was later the club of the VfL handball club Hagen, a shooting club, the La Famiglia games company and is still used today as a prop store for the Hagen city theater.

The bunker in Bergstraße 98 (15 / HAG / 5) is one of seven high-rise bunkers in Hagen and of 15 in the former Hagen Gau area, which also included districts such as Wetter and Herdecke. The Bergstrasse bunker was built as part of the immediate Führer program on October 10, 1940 and has 4 upper floors and a basement. In addition to the high air raid shelter , around 160 air raid tunnels were also built in Hagen .

Construction of the bunker on Bergstrasse began in the winter of 1940/1941 according to plans by the Hagen architect Phillipp Röll and was completed in 1942. The bunker has a floor area of ​​around 700 m² (rectangular floor plan with around 35 × 20 m, a total of around 3,500 m² floor area) and should provide shelter for around 1,200 people in 132 rooms of 6 m² each. In the event of an air raid alarm, up to 3,000 people are said to have been in the bunker. In the basement there is a small emergency kitchen and four toilets as well as a laundry room. In total, the bunker had around 560 berths and countless seats, a first aid room, accommodations for air raid and lay helpers and a guard room for the bunker guard.

The walls are up to 1.10 m thick and in the basement even 1.80 m thick, the top ceiling 1.55 m and the bottom floor 1.10 m. The inner walls are around 17.5 - 90 cm thick and the false ceilings around 15 cm. The building is about 13 m high. The facade is unplastered and has loopholes shaped ventilation openings.

Bunker Museum

organization

The bunker museum was built by the owners in cooperation with the Historisches Centrum Hagen in the basement of the bunker with an exhibition area of ​​approx. 500 m². It is the first private bunker museum in North Rhine-Westphalia.

exhibition

The exhibition concept was developed by Michaela Beiderbeck. The exhibition covers the period from 1934 to 1945. Some of the exhibits come from the former bunker, but for the most part they have been brought together from all over Germany, Austria, Belgium, England and the USA.

The basement with 21 rooms is largely in its original condition, as it was when it was used as an air raid shelter in World War II with original technical installations, facilities and objects. Among other things, the original emergency power generator from Klöckner-Humboldt-Deutz is still available, as well as a restored, functional ventilation system from DELBAG and an air filter system from Auer. In the basement of the museum, a defused 250-kg aerial bomb (on permanent loan from the city of Hagen), which was found in the Hagen city area, is on display. And since 2015 you can also see a very rare original V2 rocket tip here because the batteries for this rocket were produced in Hagen. There are also many other exhibits on air defense from the time of the Second World War. In addition, the bunker museum offers a rare exhibition on the leaflet propaganda of the Allies and visitors have the opportunity in a so-called "tracking room" to feel the atmosphere of those seeking protection on less than 6 m² in the confines of the cells. Another room shows the archaeological finds of an old, crashed Lancaster bomber to show what this bunker had to protect against at the time. The propeller blade of an old Halifax bomber can already be seen in the entrance area. In 2016, a café was added to the museum, which reflects the city of Hagen in the style of the pre-war and post-war years with many old postcards and utensils of the time to put the bunker in its historical context. The café is also like a small time museum.

The bunker was opened for the first time on September 8, 2013 in the presence of the Mayor of Hagen Brigitte Kramps and the director of the Historical Center, Ralf Blank , for the Open Monument Day . Since October 1, 2013, it has been regularly accessible to the general public. The museum can be visited all year round on every 2nd Saturday with the simulation of an air raid alarm in the dark bunker. On the third Sunday of the month you can visit the museum without a guided tour from 3 pm to 6 pm or at the bunker caching with a puzzle book through the concrete colossus. There is always a historical tour on the 4th Saturday of the month at 5 p.m.

guides

In addition to a tour of the premises and exhibits, the exhibition concept also provides for special guided tours on the second Saturday of the month, which are intended to bring visitors closer to the reality and depression of a forced bunker stay. During this tour in the basement of the bunker, known as a "simulation of an air raid alarm in the dark bunker", visitors are brought closer to the bunker life, such as air raid sirens, air situation reports and engine noises from the bomber squadron, with an original background noise. Further historical tours take place on the fourth Saturday of the month, on the third Sunday of the month between 3 and 6 p.m. you can explore the bunker without a guide or take part in bunker caching with a puzzle book and individual group tours by arrangement (also for school classes Support history class).

The catchment area of ​​the museum extends across Germany, Luxembourg , the Netherlands and Belgium .

Picture gallery

literature

  • Michaela Beiderbeck; Gottfried Beiderbeck, " Exhibition on German civilian air defense in World War II - mountain road bunker in Hagen / Westphalia ", Hagen 2013.
  • Ralf Blank, " Hagen in World War II, Bombing War, Everyday Warfare and Armaments in a Large Westphalian City 1939–1945 ", Essen 2008, klartext-verlag, ISBN 978-3-8375-0009-7 .
  • City of Hagen (ed.) " Hagen once and now ", " Fateful time in Hagen, last weeks of the war, the occupation of the city and the beginning of reconstruction " (series of publications), Volume II, Issue 2, Hagen November 25, 1948, printed by the Westphalian Publishing house Thiebes & Co.,
  • Martin Kaule, Fascination Bunker: Stone Evidence of European History , Christoph-Links-Verlag, Berlin 2014, ISBN 978-3-86153-761-8 , Google Books .

Web links

Commons : Bunkermuseum Bergstrasse Hagen  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

See also

Individual evidence

  1. a b Quotation from: Hagen once and now Volume II / Issue 2 Fateful time in Hagen ed. from the city of Hagen November 25, 1948
  2. Quote from: Dr. Ralf Blank, Hagen in the Second World War, p. 189
  3. a b Martin Kaule, Fascination Bunker: Stone Evidence of European History , Christoph-Links-Verlag, Berlin 2014, p. 37
  4. ^ WDR 3: Bunker in Hagen ( Memento from November 3, 2013 in the Internet Archive ).
  5. Bunker in North Rhine-Westphalia (table).
  6. Quotation from: Michaela & Gottfried Beiderbeck, exhibition on German civil air defense in World War II - Bergstrasse bunker in Hagen / Westf., 2013, p. 11
  7. Open Monument Day in Hagen  ( page no longer available , search in web archivesInfo: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , September 8, 2013.@1@ 2Template: Toter Link / www.hagen.de  
  8. Quoting from: Michaela & Gottfried Beiderbeck, exhibition on German civil air protection in World War II - Bergstrasse bunker in Hagen / Westf., 2013, p. 13