Scheunenviertel (Barn Quarter) is a neighborhood of Mitte, in the centre of Berlin, to the north of the medieval Altberlin area, east of the Rosenthaler Straße and Hackescher Markt. Until the WWII it was regarded as a slum district and had a substantial Jewish population, with a high proportion of migrants from Eastern Europe. The name derives from several barns erected here outside the city walls in 1672, used to store hay in connection to a large cattle market at nearby Alexanderplatz. In 1737 King Frederick William I of Prussia required Berlin Jews to settle here.
Prior to WWI, the Berlin City Council redeveloped parts of the area. Since then the core of the neighborhood is the triangular Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz, former Bülowplatz, where on 9 August 1931 the Communist and later Stasi Executive Erich Mielke shot two police officers. Following German reunification the Scheunenviertel, together with the neighbouring Spandauer Vorstadt, has become a fashionable district popular with younger people. The car shown in the postcard is a Trabant, about which I wrote here.
About the stamp
The stamp shows the Post Tower in Bonn and is one of the variable value stamps (Automatenmarken) about which I wrote here.
Sender: Marius Vasilescu
Sent from Berlin (Berlin / Germany), on 05.11.2012
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