Weimar

The outing to Weimar included information on the following:
1. the cultural heritage of Anna Amalie, Carl August, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Friedrich Schiller and Franz Liszt
Literature and music are hallmarks of the golden (and with Liszt, the silver) period in the history of the city.  These men were called/drawn to the city by the forward thinking patrons of the the king Carl August and his  mother Anna Amalie, who decided to create a cultural center in Weimar in the 18th century.  There is even a statue of Shakespeare in the park!

2. Bauhaus movement/university
In the 20th century, a group of artists and architects wanted to develop a new type of design that would incorporate all types of art and building.  People such as Vassily Kandinsky and Walter Gropius were key organizers, but the folks of Weimar found them to be too avant garde for the times.  The Bauhaus group soon moved to Dessau, then Berlin, before being driven out of Germany by the Nazi regime.  They ended up in Chicago (!) where they influenced, and were influenced by, skyscrapers and functional housing.

3. Weimar Republic
After World War II, the streets of Berlin were too dangerous to hold a congress to determine the future of the government, so the meeting was held in the quiet city of Weimar (in the National Theater, watched over by the Goethe and Schiller monument).  The result was the formation of the first democracy in Germany, which lasted only from 1919 to 1933, due in part ot hyperinflation and war reparations.

4. Buchenwald concentration campBuchenwald is about 3 miles from the city and sits on top of the Ettersberg mountain.  There are only a few buildings left standing (most were burned to the ground during the 1950s, but the memorial bears witness to the 56,000+ deaths of many different nationalities, political prisoners, POWs, as well as Jews, homosexuals, and Roma/Sinti.  The Americans liberated the camp April 11, 1945 at 3:15.  The Soviets later took over the administration of the camp (it was in the eastern zone), using it as a prison for German soldiers.

To the left is a photo of the camp from the a point near the entrance, looking at the roll-call field.  To the right is the Ettersberg mountain, taken from the highway outside of Weimar.  You can see the white tower in almost the middle.  Below and on the left is the tower at the top of the mountain, looking down toward Weimar.

This year there appears to be a city-wide joke with the street names (Schillerstraße, Frauentorstraße, Pushkinstraße), where letters are changed around.