It is a peaceful place, a green lung of 210 hectares in the heart of Berlin. Traveling the aisles of Large Tiergartenwe come across joggers, children chasing balls, a few retirees practicing tai chi postures. A guide tells us that the name of the place – which literally means “large animal garden” and which gave its name to an entire district in the center of Berlin – comes from the use that was made of it during the Renaissance: it was then a hunting reserve. Now, to see wild animals there, you have to go to the southwest corner of the site, beyond the Spree River, where one of the oldest zoos in the world purrs.
This Berlin Zoological Garden –Zoologischer Garten Berlin– opened its doors in the German capital in 1844. Thanks to the patronage of Prussian aristocrats and the constant influx of visitors, the zoo’s population grew rapidly. Berliners go there with their families to relax and to marvel at the elephant pagoda or the ostrich temple. The price of its success was that its attendance doubled between 1900 and 1940 to reach two million visitors annually.
War with animals
Unfortunately, this momentum was shattered by the Second World War. When the first Allied reconnaissance planes streaked the skies over the capital, the Berlin Zoo had more than 3,500 guests in residence. The bombers will bury them under a deluge of ashes, in 1943 and 1944. “A jumble of animals and debris lie in the hall and on the steps of the staircaseremembers Lutz Heck, the son of the director and founder of the zoo, around ten years later. Everything has disappeared, the rare European bison, the aurochs, the mouflons (…), the complete collections of monkeys, wild animals, deer and the many species of rare birds.”
Results: only 91 animals survived the deadliest conflict in history. Among the miracles, the hippopotamus Knautschke and the elephant Siam were destined to become the stars of the zoo after the war. Indeed, the Berlin population, still shaken by four years of deprivation and horror, wants to make it the symbol of its rebirth. When the Soviet blockade paralyzed the city in 1948-1949, preventing it from getting supplies, some residents organized donations to feed the hippopotamus Knautschke, its new mascot.
But misfortune never happens alone. The partition of the German capital, effective from 1948, enclosed the Berlin Zoological Park on the west side of the imaginary border, in the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG), a showcase of capitalist ideology. This situation worsened when, thirteen years later, the Berlin Wall closed this separation with a lot of concrete and barbed wire, making it impassable to visitors from the east. Deprived of a zoo, the authorities of East Berlin decided to open their own zoological garden, humbly named Tierpark Berlin (literally “Berlin Wildlife Park” in German), in 1955.
The zoos of discord
Built on the ruins of Friedrichsfelde Castle (whose owners, rich aristocrats, fled when the Red Army arrived), the young Tierpark underwent laborious construction. There is a shortage of labor and raw materials and we have to make do with what we can find.
The polar bear enclosure is set up with the ruins of the German central bank (Reichsbank), while a statue of a saber-toothed tiger, placed near the panda enclosure, is forged from a statue of Stalin recast in 1961. Ossis (East Germans) are numerous to volunteer to participate in the project: a beautiful metaphor for united socialism which fuels Soviet propaganda…
It is the beginning of a zoological rivalry which follows the codes of the East/West ideological war. Renowned for their enmity, the respective directors of the two zoos, Heinz-Georg Klös (Zoologischer Garten) and Heinrich Dathe (Tierpark), engage in merciless competition in order to acquire as many species as possible and attract as many visitors as possible.
The first seeks to demonstrate, through the quantity and rarity of the specimens exhibited, the prosperity of Western-style capitalism. The second is based on a community and naturalist approach, reflecting the great socialist convictions, to make it a “people’s park”, distant from bourgeois logic.
The bear versus the bald eagle
In this context, animals themselves serve as ideological standard-bearers. In the Tierparknear the enclosure of the spectacled bears, a discreet plaque thanks the secret police of East Germany – the formidable Stasi – for its generous contribution… Vietnamese President Ho Chi Minh donated a young elephant to the park in 1958, while Cuba donated two iguanas and China a crocodile named Mao. Most species of Tierpark are entrusted by zoos located in the satellite republics of the Soviet bloc or the nations of East Asia: the ideological struggle is also there, in the zone of geopolitical influence that the establishments can mobilize.
For its part, the management of Zoologischer Garten appeals to its donors, generally industrialists headquartered in West Berlin, to renovate its facilities. Champion of triumphant capitalism, she uses her specimens as advertising space. Named Heinrich, a lioness serves as product placement for a spirits manufacturer of the same name!
India, independent since 1950, offered the institution a rhino named Arjun in 1959, while Robert Kennedy, brother of JFK, donated a bald eagle (or bald eagle), American symbol, in 1962. The latter never acclimatized to its new habitat and died out early, which pushed Heinz-Georg Klös to replace it with a double to avoid the diplomatic incident…
It was not until the fall of the Wall in 1989, then the reunification of Germany the following year, that the two institutions stopped waging war against each other. Today, the Zoologischer Garten and the Tierpark are placed under the supervision of the same management and collaborate regularly within the framework of their conservation policy. Finally, the American eagle and the Soviet bear seem to have reconciled.
