3. 13 August 1961 The border between East and West Berlin is closed.
Soldiers start to build the wall, at first with barbed wire and light
fencing which in the coming years develops into a heavily complex
series of wall, fortified fences, gun positions and watchtowers that are
heavily guarded…
53th anniversary of the Berlin Wall

4. 15 June 1961, GDR head of state Walter Ulbricht declared that no one had
any intention of building a wall.
On 12 August 1961, the GDR Council of Ministers announced that “in order to
put a stop to the hostile activity of West Germany’s and West Berlin’s
revanchist and militaristic forces, border controls of the kind generally found in
every sovereign state will be set up at the border of the German Democratic
Republic, including the border to the western sectors of Greater Berlin.” What
the Council did not say was that this measure was directed primarily against
the GDR's own population, which would no longer be permitted to cross the
border.
In the early morning hours of 13 August 1961, temporary barriers were put up
at the border separating the Soviet sector from West Berlin, and the asphalt
and cobblestones on the connecting roads were ripped up. Police and
transport police units, along with members of “workers’ militias,” stood guard
and turned away all traffic at the sector boundaries.

5. In the years to come, the barriers were modified, reinforced, and further
expanded, and the system of controls at the border was perfected. The
Wall running through the city center, which separated East and West
Berlin from one another, was 43.1 kilometers long.
The border fortifications separating West Berlin from the rest of the GDR
were 111.9 kilometers long. Well over 100,000 citizens of the GDR tried
to escape across the inner-German border or the Berlin Wall between
1961 and 1988. More than 600 of them were shot and killed by GDR
border guards or died in other ways during their escape attempt. At least
136 people died at the Berlin Wall alone between 1961 and 1989….

10. LIFE Berlin Wall: Rare Photos From the Birth of a Brutal Divide

11. In the early 1960s, LIFE magazine’s photographers chronicled the construction
of the Berlin Wall and, once it was built, its effect on residents living in the newly
divided city. The Soviets and East Germans built the Wall, in part, to stop the
flight of Eastern Bloc citizens who frequently used Berlin as the point from which
they tried to escape to the West. (By the time the Wall was built, an estimated 20
percent of the East German population had fled.)
In its September 8, 1961 issue, LIFE wrote that the newly constructed wall, “up
to 20 feet high and tipped with cruel glass splinters, is now an all but permanent
barrier between the hapless people in both sectors [of divided Berlin] . . .
Communist inhumanity has seldom showed itself more baldly or more brutally
than in its Berlin wall—and the anguish and indignity it is now working upon the
people of Berlin, young and old, East and West.”
With the hideous bulwark in place, the ideological divide between Eastern and
Western superpowers grew sharper, more frightening and (seemingly) more
intractable. Here, LIFE.com offers powerful pictures of the construction and
earliest days of the Wall—photos that offer a glimpse into an era that today feels
at once profoundly alien, and disturbingly familiar.

12. A hand reaches above the broken glass-covered top of the Berlin Wall in August 1961. Paul Schutzer Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images.

13. A West German man lifts his son to give him a
view of the other side of the Berlin Wall, 1961.
Paul Schutzer Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images

14. A woman, foreground, who had escaped to West Berlin, speaks to her mother — who is still in East Berlin — in August 1961. Stan Wayman Time & Life
Pictures/Getty Images

15. A West Berlin woman looks out over the Berlin Wall- reflected in her window in 1961. Paul Schutzer Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images

16. American forces, in foreground, face East German forces across the newly built Berlin Wall in 1961. Paul Schutzer Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images

17. A crowd of West Berlin residents watches as an East German policeman patrols the Berlin Wall in August 1961. Paul Schutzer Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images

18. A couple enjoys a West Berlin bar as the Wall
looms in the near distance in 1961. Paul Schutzer
—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images

19. An East German mason builds up a fresh portion of the Berlin Wall in August 1961. Paul Schutzer Time & Life Pictures/Getty

20. A crowd of West Berlin youths gather to protest the construction of the Berlin Wall in August 1961. Paul Schutzer Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images

21. Sunlight shines on the barbed wire and blocks of the Berlin Wall in August 1961. Paul Schutzer Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images

22. An East German policeman uses sunlight
reflected off a mirror in an attempt to stop
photographers from taking pictures in
August 1961. Paul Schutzer Time & Life
Pictures/Getty Images

23. A West Berlin toddler attempts to open a sealed door of a house that has become part of the Berlin Wall in August 1961. Paul SchutzerTime & Life Pictures/Getty Image

24. West Berlin children, from left, Peter Friedrich, 5, Katrin Kuhl, 4, and Jurgen Bottcher, 8, build a pretend Berlin Wall in a vacant lot in October 1961. Paul Schutzer
Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images

25. West Berlin police officers jump off a truck as two others run to meet them before starting their shifts on guard duty at the Berlin Wall in October 1961. Paul
SchutzerTime & Life Pictures/Getty ImagesThree

26. An East German teen hides in tall grass, far left, awaiting a chance to jump over the Berlin Wall in October 1961. "Crouching in a tangle of grass in East Berlin,"
wrote LIFE when this escape sequence originally ran in he magazine, "and hidden except for his face [barely visible on the left side of the pic], a boy waits to make
a break over the wall he must surmount to reach the West. Nearby is a patrol of East German Vopos who will shoot to kill if they see him.“ Paul Schutzer Time & Life
Pictures/Getty Images

27. West German police look out over the Berlin Wall in order to offer their help to any potential escapees to the West in October 1961. Paul Schutzer Time & Life
Pictures/Getty Images

28. An East German teen makes his way to the West climbing over the Berlin Wall in October 1961. Paul Schutzer Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images

29. A 17-year-old East German orphan successfully slips through the barbed wire over the Berlin Wall to the West after being waved on by West Berlin police in October
1961. "This boy," wrote LIFE, "a 17-year-old orphan, was too dazed to say anything but 'Thanks, thanks,' as he shook the hands that had helped him.“Paul Schutzer
Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images

30. A Lebanese businessman, Edmond Khayat, carries an 85-pound wooden cross to protest the Berlin Wall in October 1961. Paul SchutzerTime & Life Pictures/Getty
Images

31. Birds on barbed wire strung atop the Berlin Wall in January 1962. Paul Schutzer Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images

32. A divided Berlin is seen through barbed wire
and rubble in January 1962. Paul Schutzer—
Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images

33. A young West German, Monika Heyne, plays with
a ball near the Berlin Wall in January 1962. Paul
Schutzer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images

34. An East German guard throws a ball back
to a child on the West German side of the
Berlin Wall in June 1962. Paul Schutzer /
TIME & LIFE Pictures/Getty Images

35. An East German policeman, known as a Volkspolizei or "people's police" — Vopo for short — walks at Checkpoint Charlie between East and West Berlin in October
1962Paul Schutzer Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images

36. Children chase a ball beside the Berlin Wall in December 1962. Paul Schutzer Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images

37. A girl looks at the Berlin Wall through a frosty window which reflects the Wall's silhouetted barbed wire in December 1962. Paul Schutzer Time & Life Pictures/Getty
Images

38. The Berlin Wall bears the shadowy silhouettes of West Berliners waving to their relatives on the unseen, Eastern side of the Wall in December 1962. Paul Schutzer
Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images

39. A divided Berlin, seen through a tangle of barbed wire in December 1962. Paul Schutzer Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images

40. Life around The Berlin Wall in the 1960s

41. On a day when the Berlin Wall is open, throngs of West Germans wait for friends and relatives to arrive from the Eastern sector. (Photo by Three Lions/Getty
Images). 1960

42. Russian soldiers leaving the British sector march back into the East Sector, after laying wreaths on the Soviet monument in West Berlin on the 43rd anniversary of
the Russian Revolution. The Brandenburg Gate is on the right. (Photo by Keystone/Getty Images). 7th November 1960

43. East German tanks are lined up at Warschauer Bridge in Berlin, Germany on August 13, 1961. Crossing points between East and West Berlin were heavily guarded
after Communists prevented East Germans from crossing into the West sector in an effort to stop heavy flow of refugees. (AP Photo)

44. Two little girls in a West German street chat with their
grandparents in the window of their home in the eastern
zone, separated only by a barbed wire barricade. (Photo
by Keystone/Getty Images). 14th August 1961

45. Conrad Schumann leaping over barbed wire into West Berlin on 15 August 1961. Photograph Peter Leibing AP
15 August 1961: Defecting East German soldier, Hans Conrad Schumann, leaps over a barbed wire barricade at the Bernauer Street sector into West Berlin.
Schumann made his break for freedom to join his family which had fled earlier to West Berlin.

46. West German police arrest a young man, one of the angry crowd throwing stones at a bus full of Soviet guards making their way to the Soviet War Memorial, 20th
August 1962. The crowd were incensed by the death of 18-year-old Peter Fechter, who was shot while trying to cross the Berlin Wall a few days earlier. (Photo by
Central Press/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

47. East German troops and police seal off the frontier between East and West Berlin with barbed-wire to control the flow of refugees. (Photo by Keystone/Getty
Images). 15th August 1961

48. Posters of Nikita Khrushchev, Walter Ulbricht, Wilhelm Pieck and the East German Premier Otto Grotewohl on an East Berlin Wall. (Photo by Keystone/Getty
Images). 28th August 1961

49. Stone wall doesn’t stop curious West
Berliners from viewing the Eastern
part of the city. An automobile used
by man to overcome height of
problem in Berlin August 28, 1961.
(AP Photo/Worth)

50. Stone wall doesn’t stop curious
West Berliners from viewing the
Eastern part of the city. Wooden
boxes, used by the couple at left
to overcome height of problem in
Berlin August 28, 1961. (AP
Photo/Worth)

51. East German military personnel supervising construction of the Berlin Wall. (Photo by Central Press/Getty Images). August 1961

52. Dieter and Monika Marotz of Bernauerstrasse,
Berlin, wave to relatives after their wedding, 8th
September 1961. The newlyweds live in the
western sector of Berlin, while their relatives
living on the same street are in the Eastern
sector and unable to attend the ceremony.
(Photo by Keystone/Hulton Archive/Getty
Images)

53. Relatives of newlyweds Dieter and
Monika Marotz of Bernauerstrasse,
Berlin, wave to the couple after their
wedding, 8th September 1961.
Although the Marotz's and their
relatives live in the same street, their
houses are in the western and eastern
sectors, respectively, of the divided
city, leaving them unable to be at the
ceremony together. (Photo by
Keystone/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

54. People’s policeman in work dress removing barbed wire from brick wall while other policeman in background are hightened to wall to 15 feet in Berlin Sept. 9, 1961.
At right background people's police officer. Border Bernauer Strasse at French, Russian sector. (AP Photo/E.Reichert)

55. A woman is lowered from a window in Bernauer
Strasse on a rope to escape into the western sector
of Berlin after the post-war division of the city.
(Photo by Keystone/Getty Images). 10th September
1961

56. Members of the Volkspolizei, the East German national police, check an elderly man's papers at the Berlin Wall, 11th September 1961. Only those whose houses are
adjacent to the wall are allowed within 100 meters of it. (Photo by Keystone/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

57. Families and friends, once neighbours, now stand divided and wave across to each other over the Berlin wall. (Photo by Keystone/Getty Images). 1961

58. A citizen of East Berlin peers through barbed wire at
a West Berliner over the Berlin Wall, Berlin,
Germany, 1961. The mass immigration of Germans
from Communist Berlin to Western Berlin inspired
East Germany military leader Erich Honeker to
construct the blockade, a barricade of concrete
walls, mine fields and guard posts that stretched for
100 miles. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

59. Soldiers building the Berlin Wall as instructed by the East German authorities, in order to strengthen the existing barriers dividing East and West Berlin. (Photo by
Keystone/Getty Images). 1961

60. Soldiers outside the entrance to Berlin's Potsdamer Platz underground station next to a section of the Berlin Wall. (Photo by Central Press/Getty Images). Circa 1961

61. Soviet tanks and troops at Checkpoint Charlie, a crossing point in the Berlin Wall between the American and Soviet sectors of the city at the junction of
Friedrichstrasse, Zimmerstrasse and Mauerstrasse, 1961. (Photo by Daily Express/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

62. American tanks and troops at Checkpoint Charlie, a crossing point in the Berlin Wall between the American and Soviet sectors of the city at the junction of
Friedrichstrasse, Zimmerstrasse and Mauerstrasse, 1961. (Photo by Express Newspapers/Getty Images)

63. A barricade erected by the East German
authorities to strengthen the existing barriers
dividing East and West Berlin. (Photo by
Central Press/Getty Images). 22nd November
1961

64. Two mothers can only wave to their children and grandchildren in the Soviet sector of Berlin from across the Berlin wall. (Photo by Keystone/Getty Images). 1961

65. Two West Berlin policemen with their new
American rapid fire rifles on duty with a
snowman on Christmas Day in front of the
Berlin Wall at the Brandenburg Gate. (Photo by
Keystone/Getty Images). 25th December 1961

66. A loudspeaker van from the West Berlin organisation
SAS (Studio am Stacheldraht or Studio at the Barbed
Wire) arrives at the Berlin Wall where a new section is
being built, 23rd July 1962. Shortly after this, an East
German police car turned up, blasting music and
Communist propaganda from its loudspeakers.
(Photo by Keystone/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

67. East German border guards carry away a 50
year old refugee, who was shot with three
targeted shots by East German border police on
September 4, 1962 as he dashed through
communist border installations and tried to
climb the Berlin wall in the cemetery of the
Sophien Church. (AP Photo)

68. Officers inspecting the damage to the Berlin Wall, East Germany, and making preparations for its repair, after an East German rammed the Wall with an army car
and successfully escaped. (Photo by Keystone/Getty Images). 1963

69. Sightseers climb onto a bus to look at the newly-built Berlin Wall. (Photo by Keystone/Getty Images). 1964

70. A German women hangs clothing out to dry on a line strung between a tree and the Berlin Wall, Germany, November 13, 1963 (Photo by Express Newspapers/Getty
Images).

71. end
cast 53th anniversary of the Berlin Wall
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