Re-post: Eastern Europe 1990: East Berlin and the Wall

A now-empty East German guard tower

looms above the Berlin Wall.

 

As I've mentioned before, a long-running relationship with the World Missions Department of the Church of God took me to many countries and resulted in the production of more than 60 audio-visual programs to promote and raise funds for the Church's mission efforts.

In March, 1990, just four months after the opening of the Berlin Wall, the  World Missions Department, in conjunction with the Department of Youth and Christian Education, sent Louise and me on a three-week tour of Eastern European countries to gather photographs, video footage, and script information to create an audio-visual program to inspire the young people of the Church to raise money to print Bibles for distribution in the former Communist countries just emerging into freedom. This is the first in a series of posts about what we saw.

 

We began on March 8th with a tour of the plant in Frankfurt where Bibles were being printed in Eastern European languages. The next day, just four months after the Wall was breached, found us at the Brandenburg Gate, where throngs of East Berliners lined up to enter West Berlin.

East Germans file through the checkpoint

at the Brandenburg Gate.

We spent March 9th making photographs and shooting video of West Berlin street scenes and East Germans coming through the Brandenburg Gate and other checkpoints; and of people chipping away at the wall with hammers and chisels. (I still have a small bag of pieces of the wall.)

Climbing on the Wall near the Brandenburg Gate.

Chipping away at the Wall.

Hello, World!

I was working with my Olympus OM and Leica M cameras, while Louise was using an S-VHS video camera, a state-of-the-art semi-pro video rig at the time. Her load was heavier than mine, so I had to carry some of her equipment in addition to my own full camera bag. Louise, by the way, in addition to being beautiful, has a very good eye and feel for light. Better than mine, in fact. If she chose to be a serious photographer she could run circles around me.

March 9, 1990. The Rev. Billy Graham preaches

at the historic Gethsemane Evangelical Church.

A packed house of rapt listeners.

That evening we had the privilege of photographing a momentous occasion: the Rev. Billy Graham preaching to a packed house at East Berlin's Gethsemane Evangelical Church. East Germany, the birthplace of the Protestant Reformation, was once again fully open to the gospel.

Going from the sublime to the ridiculous, the next morning we boarded the dirtiest and shabbiest airplane we have ever seen, a Yugoslav Airlines two-motor job holding about 20 passengers, and were off to the country which at that time was known as Yugoslavia.

(All photographs were made on Fujichrome 100D film except for the last two, which were made on 3M 640T film pushed one stop to E.I. 1280.)

Photographs copyright 2021, David B.Jenkins

I post Monday, Wednesday, and Friday each week.

Soli Gloria Deo

For the glory of God alone

Tags: photography, Dave Jenkins, East Germany, East Berlin, West Berlin, Berlin Wall, Brandenburg Gate, Rev. Billy Graham, Olympus OM, Leica, Fujichrome 100D film, 3M 640T film, Yugoslavia, Yugoslav Airlines