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Jaycie Dickmann
Dr. Jamison
9/14/15
Honors 9th lit
Piece of Berlin
Artifact Project

Late night on august 13th 1961 eastern Germany began the construction of the berlin wall
that would keep eastern and western Germany separated for twenty-eight years. Knowing that
this was a huge part of German history, and considering her German roots; Jaycie Dickmann
began research right away.
She knew that her father been given a piece of the Berlin Wall from when it was
demolished in 1989, but after further research he told her, the piece was given to me by my
college roommate, John Shea, around 1991 or 92. After researching her dads piece of the wall
she moved on to the piece her mom had acquired. I got my piece from my high school friend,
Gretchen Laudermilch. She was there when the wall came down. Hearing this, Jaycie was
slightly discouraged to find that both of her parents were given their pieces from friends.
However, she did not let this end her research. Jaycie moved on, and began to dig deeper into
German history, as well as her family history.
In 1949, during the Cold War, eastern Germany was founded as communist Germany.
Then, later in 1961 Germany was divided half. August 13th of 1961 marked the date that eastern

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Germany began to build a wall that would keep anyone attempting to escape to democratic
western Germany. Many easterners attempted to cross over the wall into West Germany, and
close to 5,000 Eastern Germans made it, yet over 100 died in the process of escape. This very
famous wall was known as the Berlin Wall because it split right through the countrys capital,
Berlin. It was truly amazing that anyone made it being that the 12 foot high wall was constantly
being patrolled by armed soldiers and vicious watch dogs. There were also many different
obstacles between the eastern wall and the western wall watch towers, trip wire, barbed wire,
electric fencing, soft sand pits, trench, and then the thick pipe placed atop of the west wall made
climbing over almost impossible. With all of these barriers on the surface many chose to dig
under the fence, or fly across (hot air balloon).
When the wall was first built many people lost their jobs due to the fact that their place of
business was on the other side of the barrier. On top of that, eastern and western families and
friends were separated for nearly 30 years. So, when the wall came down in 1989 it was really a
huge sigh of relief for those who had been separated from loved ones, and easterners in general.
Overall, Germans finally had a chance to be free again.
After finding the interesting information on Germanys history Jaycie turned to her own
history. Form the start she knew that her fathers side was primarily German. Her main goal
immediately was to find out what year the Dickmanns immigrated to America. She began to ask
her dad, and he referred her to his parents, her grandparents, and they both agreed that the

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Dickmanns, and Kruses, both last names of Jaycies grandpas parents, probably immigrated
here in the late 1800s, shortly after the civil war.
When Jaycie inspected the small piece of concrete she had obtained, and realized that on
what would be the outside layer of the wall there seemed to be colorful paint. It was very
common for exterior parts of the west wall to have graffiti art, so she easily concluded that the
piece was more than likely part of the western wall. This sparked more questions that Jaycie
needed the answer to. Desperate for answers she quickly called her grandma and asked her if she
knew what part of Germany the family used to live in. I could hear her talking to my grandpa in
the background while I waited for my answer patiently I continued to read about the cold war,
finally Judy, Jaycies grandma, was able to get a solid answer, it was probably western. Not
berlin, but further away, she said. This was quite a relief even though she knew that there
probably was not any of her own family left in Germany at the time.
Even though there were not a lot of family ties to the artifact, and Jaycies family; she
was very pleased with what she did learn from the little piece of colorful concrete. However, she
was slightly disappointed with the answer her grandmother gave her when she asked if there
would still be any relatives in Germany. Her grandmas answer was unsure, but the answer was
most likely a negative. Jaycie hopes to someday visit Germany to get a real taste of her culture,
and possibly learn more.

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Bibliography
"Berlin Wall." History.com. A&E Television Networks, n.d. Web. 16
Sept. 2015.
Rosenberg, Jennifer. "The Berlin Wall." N.p., n.d. Web. 16 Sept. 2015.