The Great Escape beneath the Berlin wall (1964)

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Credit:
Created by Daniel Turner (B.A. (Hons) in History, University College London)
Script: Conan White
Narrator:

Chris Kane

[stalkerentertainment]

The crazy thing was that each escape attempt helped in adapting the wall to hinder any future escape attempts but really there were so many other escape stories, some really bold...

[youngmasterzhi]

You should do a 1961 story of how an East German train engineer literally crashed his locomotive straight through the Berlin Wall, along with his family and 16 other strangers who were in for the ride

[kevinmackay]

WOW! Shoutout to the team at Simple History for pumping out the content continuously over the last few weeks!! We really appreciated the hard work you all put in! Cheers!

[GuhTheBruh]

"Freedom has many difficulties and democracy is not perfect, but we have never had to put a
wall up to keep our people in, to prevent them from leaving us…"
-John F. Kennedy"

[Duke_of_Lorraine]

Another succesful escape : a man rented a fancy car, somehow got an uniform of an important Soviet officer, had an accomplice serving as his chauffeur, and just passed Checkpoint Charlie, no one dared asking for his papers on the eastern side.

[bogustoastnone]

Love how at the end they just replay their tunnel drawings with no sound, so all you get to feel are seconds of eerie silence to what was explained as minute, just to get a sense of how it was.

[brucebelvin]

West Berliner: "You smell like scheisse. Did you just escape through tunnel 57?"
Escapee: "No I was practicing for the Tokyo Olympics. I'm a pole vaulter."

[Nint-kmkd]

I remembered stories of our history teacher from when she attended school. In the 70's when she was a kid, the teachers back then told her that the wall in Berlin was there to stay strong for possibly centuries and wouldn't collapse.

[openthinker]

“Democracy isn’t perfect, but we have never had to build a wall to keep our people in.”
John F. Kennedy, shortly after the wall was built.

[RDSyafriyar]

"To understand is hard. Once one understands, action is easy." - Sun Yat-sen

[wojszach]

For some mysterious reasons communistic countries have more guns on border facing inwards rather than outwards, anyone knows why?

[timg]

Excellent!
Some of the most dramatic pictures I have ever seen are from East Germans running across the border into West Germany and to FREEDOM, before the Berlin wall was built. Some escaping over the wall before it was completed and some great pics of those who had just escaped. Now staring back across the border at the guards who just tried to kill them just a few seconds before.
The famous pic of an East German guard shedding his weapon and his gear as he flees across the border into freedom and into West Germany is my favorite. Staring back across the border at your (now former) co-workers is priceless.
The courage the West German border guards displayed in protecting those who ran across the border is often overlooked.

[BloodlMagic]

*the folks at Simple History:* "have you heard of this historic event? Well let us tell you a lesser known part of it!" And that's what makes this channel one of my favorites.

[NeoDragonCount]

Can't say this enough; I love Simple History and I watch, and re-watch, their videos all the time! Learned about stuff they never covered in history class!

[friendlyman_]

Went to Berlin and got a tour around the Stasi prison there from someone who tried to cross the Berlin wall. Absolutely crazy tactics they used to break people, like driving for 3 hours aimlessly so you didn't know you were still near Berlin, no windows to look out of to tell the time of day or where you were, soundproof 'silent rooms' where they basically tried to drive you mad. If anyone is interested, it was the 'Berlin-Hohenschonhausen' memorial and it's well worth the tour if you can get it.

[drivenbyrage]

My mother escaped from East Germany around the same time. She never liked to talk about it. My guess is she went through some terrible things as a teenage girl before she finally got out. Now, I wonder if she was one of the ones who used the tunnels to escape. She is 85 with dementia now. I guess I'll never know.

[sankyu]

When you have max walls in your townhall but your enemie spams miners instead

[garrisonnichols]

Ronald Reagan was told by some of his entourage not to mention the wall when he went to the American sector in Berlin. He was at a restaurant and asked a waitress about her feelings about the Berlin wall. She told him a story about escaping years ago and how most of her family was still trapped behind on the other side where she hadn't seen them since. The rest is history.

[thecheebra]

Have you done the story of the family who escaped east germany with a hot air balloon? It's probably the most creative way someone escaped east germany.

[peterhuehn]

My dad and his family escaped East Germany in 1961. My grandfather told the guard that they were going into the west to go to the zoo and would be back by sun down and they were let through.