The Scheunenviertel used to be an area in what is now Berlin's Mitte
district, not far from the historic city center, north of the city wall
between Hackescher Markt and today's Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz.
The
entire area between Friedrichstraße and Karl-Liebknecht-Straße is often
referred to as the Scheunenviertel, which is bordered in the south by
the Stadtbahn (roughly the course of the old city wall) and the Spree,
and in the north by Linienstraße and Torstraße. In fact, the
Scheunenviertel only includes the part of the Spandau suburb to the east
of Rosenthaler Straße. The eponymous barn lanes were only in the area of
today's Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz, delimited by today's Almstadtstrasse (to
the west), Hirtenstrasse (to the south), Linienstrasse (to the north)
and Kleine Alexanderstrasse (to the east). None of the barn lanes exist
anymore in their former form.
Prussia
In 1670, the Great Elector Friedrich Wilhelm had forbidden
the maintenance of barns within the city limits for fire protection
reasons, around 1672 he ordered the construction of 27 barns in the
immediate vicinity of what was then the city wall. This is how today's
Scheunenviertel came into being. At that time, Alexanderplatz was a
cattle market that required large amounts of hay and straw to operate.
Since the fire protection regulations prohibited the storage of such
flammable materials within the city wall, the barns were built outside
the wall. North of today's Dircksenstraße, which roughly marks its
course in front of the baroque city fortifications, there were extensive
agricultural areas. The Scheunenviertel also served as a home for the
farm workers employed there. After the demolition of the city wall, the
area was built on, but popularly kept its old name.
In 1737
Friedrich Wilhelm I ordered all Berlin Jews who did not own a house to
move to the Scheunenviertel. This law and the regulation that Jews were
only allowed to enter the city through the two northern city gates -
initially only through the Rosenthaler Tor, later also through the
Prenzlauer Tor - led to the development of a quarter with strong Jewish
cultural influences at this point. In addition to the Heidereutergasse
synagogue, the Jewish cemetery in Berlin-Mitte and the Jewish cemetery
on Schönhauser Allee were built in the immediate vicinity of the
Scheunenviertel.
In view of these conditions, it was obvious for
many eastern Jewish immigrants to also settle here when they came to
Berlin from the middle of the 19th century. This quickly led to a strong
increase in the number of residents in this area. In a confined space,
the families had to share their room with bed boys in shifts. A typical
line of business in the second half of the 19th century was the emerging
cigarette manufacture with all family members.
Time of industrialization
The process of
industrialization left serious traces in the Scheunenviertel. After the
founding of the German Empire in 1871, Berlin became the largest
industrial city in Europe. The population density increased rapidly
within a few years, and the housing needs of the workers moving in were
only belatedly and insufficiently reduced by the construction of
tenements in the newly emerging districts. In the small-scale old
buildings of the Scheunenviertel there was urgency. Many newcomers found
their first home here. The scarce sleeping places in the sublet
apartments were often shared in the same way as the shifts in the nearby
Borsig works. Those who neither slept nor worked stayed in the streets
or spent what little free time they had in one of the numerous pubs in
the district (for example in the so-called Mulackei or Mulackritze
around Mulackstrasse). During this time, Grenadierstrasse (today:
Almstadtstrasse) developed into the main street for orthodox Eastern
European Jews, often referred to as the "ghetto with open gates".
Because of the catastrophic structural and social situation, the
Berlin magistrate decided to completely redesign the district from
1906/1907. Until then, four of the original eight barn alleys still
existed, but after the demolition of many buildings, the street network
around Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz was redesigned:
First barn alley - today
overbuilt
Second Scheunengasse – today: Rosa-Luxemburg-Straße (with a
different street layout)
Third Scheunengasse - today: Zolastraße
(only this part is still based on the old course of the street, but it
is only an extension to Linienstraße, which did not exist at the time)
Fourth Scheunengasse – today: Weydingerstraße (with a different street
layout)
Small barn alley - today overbuilt
Because of the
First World War, however, the remodeling of the entire district was
canceled, so that the old building structure is still present in the
western area, while modern buildings from the first decades of the 20th
century dominate at Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz.
Scheunenviertel pogrom
1923
During the Weimar Republic, the Scheunenviertel was repeatedly
the target of police raids and anti-Semitic pogroms. In the early 1920s,
Berlin police chief Wilhelm Richter ordered a major raid against the
Jewish population in the Scheunenviertel, during which around 300 Jewish
men, women and children were picked up by the police and interned in a
"Jewish camp" near Zossen.
As hyperinflation progressed,
thousands of unemployed people gathered in front of the employment
office on Gormannstraße on November 5, 1923 to collect support money.
However, the crowd was soon informed that there was no more money
available for payment. Agitators then approached the enraged crowd,
spreading the word that “Galicians” (Eastern Jews) from the
Scheunenviertel had bought up the available money as planned. Riots soon
began in the Scheunenviertel with its backyards and street vendors,
directed against all people and businesses that appeared “Jewish” to the
crowd. People were dragged out of their homes and beaten up, and
business facilities were vandalized. Contemporary newspapers such as the
Vossische Zeitung reported that the police had been remarkably reserved
during the riots, when it would have been easy for them to stop the
crowd.
The confusion of names
The Scheunenviertel is often
equated with the Spandau suburb. This has the following historical
background: At the beginning of the 20th century, the Scheunenviertel
had developed into a social hotspot. The district was characterized by
poverty, prostitution and petty crime and had a corresponding reputation
among the Berlin population. The first ring club, a criminal
organization, was founded in the Scheunenviertel in 1891. In contrast,
in the western part of the suburb of Spandau, a middle-class, Jewish
milieu had established itself. The Reformed Jewish Community also had an
important center here with the New Synagogue on Oranienburger Strasse.
In order to disparage the Jews living in the western suburb of Spandau,
the National Socialists extended the name Scheunenviertel, which had
fallen into disrepute, to the entire Spandau suburb, incorrectly
including Oranienburger Straße with the new synagogue.