Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
The Altes Museum opens as the first of five institutions on Museumsinsel (Museum
Island). The last (the Pergamonmuseum) opens exactly 100 years later.
1837
The Industrial Age kicks into high gear with the founding of August Borsig's machine
factory, which in 1840 builds Germany's first locomotive.
1838
Berlin's first train embarks on its maiden voyage from Berlin to Potsdam, making the
city the centre of an expanding rail network throughout Prussia.
1848
Berlin is swept up in the popular revolutions for democratic reform and a united Ger-
many but after a few months the Prussian army restores the old order.
1862
Chief city planner James Hobrecht solves the housing shortage by constructing claus-
trophobic working-class ghettos of tenement blocks.
1871
Employing an effective strategy of war and diplomacy, Prussian chancellor Otto von
Bismarck forges a unified Germany with Prussia at its helm and Berlin as its capital.
1877
Berlin's population reaches the one million mark, and this almost doubles by 1900.
1891
Berlin engineer Otto Lilienthal, known as the 'Glider King', makes the world's first suc-
cessful glider flight, over 25m. Five years later he dies in an air accident.
1902
After two decades of debate and eight years of construction, the first segment of the
Berlin U-Bahn network is inaugurated, between Warschauer Strasse and Ernst-
Reuter-Platz.
1918
