Title
1960s Germany Berlin Wall Potsdamer Platz Death Strip Watchtower Viewing Postcard
Front Description
A colour photographic postcard printed in chrome finish on white card stock, horizontal format.
The image is an elevated view across Potsdamer Platz from the West Berlin side, looking east over the Berlin Wall into the East Berlin sector, photographed in bright summer sunlight under a clear blue sky.
Running diagonally across the middle of the composition is the Berlin Wall itself — a long unbroken barrier of pale concrete slab construction, topped with a smooth rounded pipe coping, receding into the distance toward the right.
Beyond the Wall lies the death strip: a vast open expanse of cleared ground laid to rough grass and bare earth, criss-crossed by patrol roads, concrete track-ways and the ghost lines of vanished streets. A long line of steel anti-vehicle obstacles — Czech hedgehogs, welded from crossed girders — is ranged across the strip. Watchtowers, guard huts and small concrete structures stand at intervals, with lamp standards, a bus, and further barriers and control posts visible. A yellow and red sign board stands in the middle ground.
In the left foreground, on the West Berlin side, stands a tall steel viewing platform on lattice legs — one of the wooden and steel Aussichtsplattformen erected so that visitors could look over the Wall — with a stepped access stair. Below and around it cluster low buildings, a row of small souvenir kiosks and refreshment stands with striped awnings and parasols in red and orange, a snack trailer, and a dark parked car. A solitary figure walks along the pavement.
In the immediate foreground a broad tarmac roadway, still carrying disused tram rails, runs toward the barrier and is closed off by red-and-white striped boom barriers and a traffic signal. At the lower right stands a yellow guard hut or works cabin with a curved roof and steps.
Along the far horizon rises the East Berlin skyline: long ranks of pale post-war ministry and administrative blocks, older domed and towered buildings, church spires, a tall industrial chimney at the right, and the dome of a major building at centre right, all beneath a wide expanse of blue sky.
The card shows light wear consistent with age, with faint surface scratches at the upper area, minor edge chipping at the right, and light corner wear.
Back Description
Divided-back colour postcard reverse, printed in brown ink on cream stock.
Upper left, the caption in three lines: BERLIN / Potsdamer Platz / Potsdam Spuare. Note: “Square” is misspelled as “Spuare” in the printed English caption — a printer’s error.
Upper right, a stamp box outlined in a dotted rule, containing the catalogue reference: B 1/M 22 F
Centre, printed vertically along the dividing rule: ANDRES + CO VERLAG
Lower centre, a printed square logo device containing a triangle and the word ANCO.
A vertical rule runs down the centre of the card, separating the message area from the address panel.
Right-hand side: three dotted address lines above a solid ruled line.
No message, address, stamp or postmark is present — the card is unused and postally unwritten. The paper shows light cream toning, a few faint specks, and light wear to the corners and edges.
Estimated Era
Circa 1965–1975.
The dating rests on several converging lines of evidence. The Berlin Wall was begun on 13 August 1961; the barrier shown here is of the developed concrete-slab type with rounded pipe coping, corresponding to the third-generation Wall of the mid to late 1960s rather than the rough first-generation barrier of 1961–62.
The presence of an established public viewing platform, souvenir kiosks and refreshment stands on the West Berlin side indicates that Wall tourism was already well developed, pointing to the later 1960s or 1970s. Potsdamer Platz, once the busiest traffic intersection in Europe, was devastated by wartime bombing and then bisected by the sector boundary, becoming one of the most desolate stretches of the death strip — the emptiness shown here being its defining characteristic throughout the division of the city.
Further supporting evidence includes the chrome-era glossy colour photographic printing with fine halftone screen, the continental card size, and the publisher imprint of Andres + Co Verlag with the ANCO logo, a Berlin firm active in this period.
Note: Coins & Banknotes Grading
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