Oranienburg

Oranienburg


Coat of arms
Oranienburg

Coordinates: 52°45′16″N 13°14′13″E / 52.75444°N 13.23694°E / 52.75444; 13.23694Coordinates: 52°45′16″N 13°14′13″E / 52.75444°N 13.23694°E / 52.75444; 13.23694
Country Germany
State Brandenburg
District Oberhavel
Government
 • Mayor Hans-Joachim Laesicke (SPD)
Area
 • Total 162.37 km2 (62.69 sq mi)
Population (2015-12-31)[1]
 • Total 43,526
 • Density 270/km2 (690/sq mi)
Time zone CET/CEST (UTC+1/+2)
Postal codes 16515
Dialling codes 03301
Vehicle registration OHV
Website www.oranienburg.de

Oranienburg is a town in Brandenburg, Germany. It is the capital of the district of Oberhavel.

Geography

Oranienburg is a town located on the banks of the Havel river, 35 km north of the centre of Berlin.

Division of the town

Oranienburg consists of 9 districts

History

Originally named Bötzow, the town of Oranienburg dates from the 12th century and was first mentioned in 1216. Margrave Albert the Bear (ruled 1157-1170) allegedly ordered the construction of a castle on the banks of the Havel. Around the castle stood a settlement of traders and craftsmen.

In 1646 Friedrich Wilhelm I of Brandenburg married Louise Henriette of Orange-Nassau (German: Oranien-Nassau). She was so attracted by the town of Bötzow that her husband presented the entire region to her. The princess ordered the construction of a new castle in the Dutch style and called it Oranienburg or Schloss Oranienburg. In 1653 the town of Bötzow was renamed Oranienburg.

Silvio Gesell, the founder of Freiwirtschaft ("free economy"), lived in Oranienburg between 1911 and 1915, publishing his magazine, Der Physiocrat. He returned to the town in 1927 and lived there until his death in 1930. The town remained a center of the "free economy" movement until the Nazi régime outlawed it in 1933, and many of Gesell's followers ended up as prisoners in the town's concentration camp.

The Oranienburg concentration camp (established in March 1933) was one of the first Nazi concentration camps. In 1936 the Sachsenhausen concentration camp on the outskirts of Oranienburg replaced it; there 200,000 people were interned over the 9 years that the Nazis operated it. The Nazis murdered about 22,000 people there before the liberation of the camp by the Soviet Red Army in 1945. Thereafter the site reopened in August 1945 as "Soviet Special Camp 7". A further 12,000 people (mostly Nazis not awaiting trial) died under the Soviets before the Special Camp closed in 1950. Their remains were not discovered until the 1990s.

Oranienburg became the center of Nazi Germany's nuclear-energy project. According to military historian Antony Beevor, Stalin's desire to acquire that facility motivated him to launch the Battle for Berlin[2] of April-May 1945. It has been claimed that the pre-emptive destruction of these facilities by the USAAF Eighth Air Force on 15 March 1945 aimed to prevent them from falling into Soviet hands.[3]

On 23 April 1945, during the Battle of Berlin, troops of the 1st Belorussian Front of the Red Army captured Oranienburg.

As of 2014, almost 70 years after World War II, about 300 pieces of unexploded ordnance (UXO) remain below the pavement. Oranienburg is the only city in Germany which pursues a systematic search for UXO based on postwar aerial photos and magnetic or radar underground measurements for metal. It is estimated that the search and safe detonation will continue throughout the rest of the century. In one case 12,000 residents had to be evacuated. The federal government does not finance the removal of foreign UXO.[4]

International relations

Oranienburg is twinned with:

Public institutions

The Zehlendorf transmission facility, a large facility for broadcasting in longwave, medium wave and FM-range, is located near Oranienburg, at Zehlendorf.

Runge plaque

See also

Demography

Oranienburg:
Population development within the current boundaries[5]
Year Population
1875 9 514
1890 11 568
1910 20 179
1925 23 656
1933 27 043
1939
1946 31 893
1950 32 781
1964 33 379
1971 33 426
Year Population
1981 33 433
1985 37 234
1989 37 544
1990 37 113
1991 36 909
1992 36 777
1993 36 885
1994 37 138
1995 37 577
1996 38 151
Year Population
1997 39 001
1998 39 541
1999 39 949
2000 40 148
2001 40 403
2002 40 378
2003 40 593
2004 41 055
2005 41 115
2006 41 267
Year Population
2007 41 488
2008 41 577
2009 41 590
2010 41 810
2011 41 370
2012 41 621

Detailed data sources are to be found in the Wikimedia Commons.[6]

Footnotes

  1. ↑ "Bevölkerung im Land Brandenburg nach amtsfreien Gemeinden, Ämtern und Gemeinden 31. Dezember 2015 (Fortgeschriebene amtliche Einwohnerzahlen auf Grundlage des Zensus 2011)". Amt für Statistik Berlin-Brandenburg (in German). 2016.
  2. ↑ Antony Beevor Berlin: The Downfall 1945, Penguin Books, 2002, ISBN 0-670-88695-5 Preface xxxiv
  3. ↑ Richard G. Davis,Bombing the European Axis Powers. A Historical Digest of the Combined Bomber Offensive 1939–1945 Alabama: Air University Press, 2006, page 518
  4. ↑ Rundfunk Berlin-Brandenburg (10 March 2015). "Bombenjäger". ARD.de. Retrieved 12 March 2015.
  5. ↑ Boundaries as of 2013
  6. ↑ Population Projection Brandenburg at Wikimedia Commons

Media related to Oranienburg at Wikimedia Commons

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