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Revision as of 00:32, 7 August 2007 by Clintonesque (talk | contribs) (wl)(diff) ← Previous revision | Latest revision (diff) | Newer revision → (diff)Niederkirchnerstraße, formerly Prinz-Albrecht-Straße, is a street in Berlin, the capital of Germany. The street runs west from Wilhelmstraße to Stresemanstraße. It is best known for being the the location of the headquarters of the Gestapo and the SS in Nazi Germany. The site is now marked by the Topography of Terror museum.
Niederkirchnerstraße is also the site of two other Berlin landmarks, the Martin-Gropius-Bau, built by Martin Gropius in 1881 and now an exhibition centre, and the Abgeordneten Haus von Berlin, formerly the seat of the Prussian Landtag (legislature) and now the meeting place of the Parliament of the State of Berlin. The Communist Party of Germany was founded in this building.
The street was originally named for Prince Albrecht of Prussia, son of King Friedrich Wilhelm III, who owned a large house called the Prinz-Albrecht-Palais on the corner of this street and Wilhelmstraße. This building formed the nucleus of the complex of buildings which was taken over by Heinrich Himmler in 1933 and developed into the centre of Gestapo and SS administration for the whole of Germany and occupied Europe, where many political prisoners were tortured and executed. The buildings were destroyed by Allied bombing in early 1945 and demolished after the war.
After World War II, the street was renamed Niederkirchnerstraße in honour of Michael Niederkirchner, a pre-war trade union leader. The Berlin Wall ran along the southern side of the street from 1961 to 1989, and a section of the wall is preserved at the western end of the street.
52°30′26″N 13°22′57″E / 52.50722°N 13.38250°E / 52.50722; 13.38250
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