Berlin Sportpalast
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Berlin Sportpalast (German:
Early years
Built at Potsdamer Straße 172, principally as an indoor ice rink for ice hockey and skating events, the Sportpalast was a sensation at the time of its opening in November 1910, and was at the time the largest such enclosed skating facility in the world. In later years, the Sportpalast also hosted non-winter sporting events such as six-day bicycle races and professional boxing matches in which well-known German boxer Max Schmeling fought. The Sportpalast was also used as a meeting hall for a variety of events, including political rallies and the Bockbierfest (Bock beer festival) with Bavarian bands, dancing, and roasted meat.
During the tumultuous years of the
Nazi era
Even after the
In 1937 it was the site of an
The Sportpalast was the site of Hitler's Winterhilfe address of September 4, 1940, in which he announced a shift to bombing of British cities rather than only military targets, heralding the beginning of the London Blitz. But the most significant of many Nazi speeches and rallies at the Sportpalast was Goebbels's Total War speech on February 18, 1943 – two weeks after the disastrous German defeat in the Battle of Stalingrad. In his fanatical appeal to "totaler Krieg" before a select Nazi audience, Goebbels sought to rally the German people to heightened support for the war, which had begun to turn against Germany and was producing ever-growing casualty lists.
Postwar years
At war's end in 1945, the Sportpalast was in badly damaged condition with its roof destroyed. The building did not reopen for public ice sports until 1951, but those events were not popular because the rink was open to the elements and thus too cold for spectators to enjoy. A new roof was constructed later, with the building reopening in 1953. Among the notables who performed at the Sportpalast in its postwar years was the world-famous figure skater Sonja Henie.
In the early 1950s, the banker Heinz Henschel attempted to revive the Sportpalast, which he had played in as a member of the Berliner Schlittschuhclub.[1]
With the division of the city between East and West in the
By the 1970s, the operation of the hall was no longer profitable. The Sportpalast closed in 1973 and was torn down and replaced by a high-rise apartment complex, dubbed the "
References
- ^ "Sportpalast: Leidenschaft bedenklich". Der Spiegel (in German). 1951-12-05. Retrieved 2019-02-09.