Henry Ford Building
| Henry Ford Building | |
|---|---|
 Henry Ford Building |
|
| Data | |
| place | Berlin-Dahlem |
| architect | Franz-Heinrich Sobotka and Gustav Müller |
| Architectural style | New Objectivity |
| Construction year | 1952-1954 |
| Coordinates | 52 ° 26 '52.3 " N , 13 ° 16' 42.9" E |
The Henry Ford Building is one of the representative buildings of the Free University of Berlin (FU). It was built between 1952 and 1954 according to plans by the architects Franz-Heinrich Sobotka and Gustav Müller (1906-1987).
History and function
In June 1951 in West Berlin the American industrialist Henry Ford II and the President of the Ford Foundation discussed with the politicians Ernst Reuter , Otto Suhr and Joachim Tiburtius as well as the Rector of the FU, Hans Kress von Kressenstein , about support for the university by the Ford Foundation. As a result, the foundation agreed to finance buildings on land that the Senate left to the FU. The foundation stone for the lecture hall and library building was laid on July 24, 1952. Kreß described it as a "memorial to the founders who helped German youth in difficult times." The building planned as the main building of the FU was selected from 28 submitted designs, as the light-flooded building, planned on an area of 18,000 square meters, thanks to the fully glazed long side the values of the university: freedom, openness and transparency and the motto democracy as the client . It was built from 1952 to 1954 in the New Objectivity style; the construction costs were eight million Deutschmarks. A bridge connects the auditorium to the maximum with the university library .
Some important personalities received the honorary doctorate of the FU in the Auditorium Maximum and gave a speech in this context: among them Louise Schroeder 1956 , 1958 Celal Bayar , 1963 John F. Kennedy , 1963 Walter Gropius , 1992 Hans Jonas , 1995 Fernando Henrique Cardoso , 1999 Bronislaw Geremek , 1999 Salman Rushdie , 2001 Kofi Annan , 2005 Günter Grass and 2007 Orhan Pamuk .
From 1966 the main auditorium of the Henry Ford Building was the center of student protests . The first priority was to improve the study conditions. In 1967 the foundation of the Critical University (KU) was proclaimed as a counter model to the FU. At another meeting, however, the seal of the FU was torn from the wall and set on fire in front of the doors of the rectorate. Later, under the spokesman for the SDS Rudi Dutschke , the Vietnam War, for example, was also the subject of protests.
From 2005 to 2007 the building was completely refurbished for four million euros. Since then, the building has accommodated four lecture halls and the maximum auditorium for lectures by the Politics department, as well as conference rooms. The Audimax is called the Max Kade Auditorium because the American Max Kade Foundation undertook its renovation in the amount of € 600,000. Since 2005, the permanent gallery: Future has adorned the building from the very beginning with the faces of important politicians from contemporary history.
The Academic Senate meets in the Henry Ford Building . Because of the dispute over more restrictive study conditions, there were repeated protests by the student body around the building until 2013. The repeated massive police operations to end the protests led to upheavals between the AStA and the President of the FU.
The building is used for numerous celebrations, congresses and public events. The Margherita von Brentano Prize has been awarded here since 1995 and the Freedom Prize since 2007 . Since 1996, the InFU.tage has been held in the building for prospective students, as well as numerous matriculation celebrations for freshmen.
Controversy over the name
Since the reopening in 2007 there has been a controversy about the namesake of the building, because the car maker and inventor of Fordism Henry Ford (1863–1947) was also the editor of the influential anti-Semitic publication The International Jew (1920) and recipient of the Grand Cross of the German Eagle Order , the highest award for foreigners that Nazi Germany bestowed. According to official information from Freie Universität, its main building is named after Ford's grandson Henry Ford II (1917–1987).
The historian Ralf Hoffrogge , who worked at the FU's AstA at the time, came to the conclusion during his research in the university archives that only the car manufacturer Henry Ford could be meant, since Henry Ford II was not mentioned in the documents. In addition, it is unusual to name buildings after living people.
Trivia
The Henry Ford building was the motif of a definitive stamp issued by the Deutsche Bundespost Berlin in 1964 .
The building and the premises were shown in the 1966 British film The Quiller Memorandum - Danger from the Dark as a primary school.
In April 2014, the building was used for Hitman: Agent 47 filming . The building here was an American consulate.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ 1954: June 19, 1954 Inauguration of the Henry Ford Building . Information on the architects at Chronik der FU .
- ↑ Hans J. Reichhardt (arrangement): Berlin. Chronicle of the years 1951–1954 . Spitzing, Berlin 1968, for advice on p. 104, quote from Kreß on laying the foundation stone p. 441
- ↑ How the house was created, FU website, February 13, 2016
- ↑ Small Chronicle of the Freie Universität website of the FU, February 13, 2016
- ^ Witnesses of heated student protests on the FU website, Sabrina Wendling from September 3, 2009
- ↑ Speak Ka-U Der Spiegel from November 6, 1967
- ↑ The renovated Henry Ford building opens in Tagesspiegel on April 15, 2007
- ^ Henry Ford Building of the Free University of Berlin on the FU website, February 13, 2016
- ↑ Room overview on the FU website, February 13, 2016
- ^ Police after the AS meeting but at the university at furios-campus.de, Veronika Völlinger from February 8, 2013
- ^ Freedom Prize website of the FU, February 13, 2016
- ↑ Invitation to the matriculation ceremony ( memento of the original from February 13, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Charité website, February 13, 2016
- ↑ References website of the FU, February 13, 2016
- ^ Henry Ford Building of the Free University of Berlin on fu-berlin.de, accessed on September 26, 2017.
- ^ Central Council of Jews in Germany Kdö.R .: History: Anti-Semites and their grandchildren | Jewish general. Retrieved February 23, 2017 .
- ↑ A touch of Hollywood in the Henry Ford Building, press release of the FU from April 11, 2014
