When Wilhelm I – at Bismarck’s urging – was crowned Kaiser in 1871, “his” Berlin was still “the only major European city in which we walk along the banks of stinking gutters every day” – there was no sewage system. When Bismarck left in 1890, 144 kilometers of sewage canals had been built and 584 kilometers of pipes laid.
In his book, Bruno Preisendörfer reveals what this meant for residents’ noses and for the free flow of traffic. Similar things also happened everywhere else. Thousands of kilometers of railroad, power, and telegraph lines were laid at incredible speed, factories were built, and the population boomed. The gap between rich and poor grew enormously, and old work and family structures, as well as value systems broke down.
In Bruno Preisendörfer’s journey through time, we stroll through Wilhelmstrasse and get to know its inhabitants one building at a time, we visit cafés, studios, and dance halls, as well as factories, offices, and courtyards. We chug along for 16 hours on the early train from Berlin to Cologne, watch as the first six girls are admitted to the university entrance exam, and witness Franziska Tiburtius be the first female doctor to open a practice. We dine with Fontane, accompany Ferdinand Lasalle to a duel, Marx to a workers’ meeting, Bismarck to war, and the Kaiser to the coronation.
