Welcome

As mayor a.D. of the city of Falkensee I warmly welcome you on the website of the history of the city of Falkensee. This page informs about the development of our city and also includes texts and illustrations of the panels that have been erected in the city area since 2019 in historically significant locations and also on the historical park.

In the coming months and years more panels will follow.

All texts and illustrations are summarized on this website.

Foto: Repro. Messtischblatt „Section Rohrbeck", 1868 Archiv Museum Falkensee

Today's Falkensee was created by the merger of two villages: Falkenhagen and Seegefeld. While Seegefeld was first mentioned in documents in 1265, Falkenhagen found its first written mention only in 1336. Both villages are referred to in the original sense as Angerdörfer. Seegefeld has in contrast to Falkenhagen a special feature: the manor. The large estate, with manor house and farm, was in the center of the small village in Brandenburg. Today, the name "Am Gutspark" testifies to its former existence.

In 1777 the inn "Finkenkrug" was built, which was later called "Alter Finkenkrug". In his "Walks through the Mark Brandenburg" Theodor Fontane reports about the "Finkenkrug" and about the diverse nature of Bredower forest.

Trippers discovered the surroundings. Like Fontane, the Berliners, Spandauer and Charlottenburger flocked to Finkenkrug. The historical place Finkenkrug was off the village centers and belonged to the territory of the Damsbrück forest estate

The manor in Seegefeld was acquired in 1888 by Bernhard Ehlers from Berlin. He parceled out and sold land to people willing to settle in Berlin and the surrounding area. The first real estate sales date to the year 1892. The German Settlement Bank took over in 1898 large parts of the manor to continue the parcelling in the sense of Ehlers - the "colony Neufinkenkrug" arises.

The construction of the Berlin - Hamburg railway in 1846 was decisive for this rapid development. Two years later, in 1848, the first trains stopped in Seegefeld. Not only the travel enthusiasts from Berlin and the surrounding area discovered the wonderful surroundings by train connection, but also tradesmen and tradesmen recognized the advantages of a railway siding. An important prerequisite for the settlement of trade and industry.

The railway station in Seegefeld, which became Falkensee station in 1927, and the railway station in Finkenkrug were all in keeping with the architecture of Märkischer Bahnhofs in the mid-19th century. They did not stay.

Since the end of the 19th century, colonies arose on the one hand on former manor estate (Neufinkenkrug and Neufinkenkrug) or on farmland (Falkenhain and Falkenhagener Alps) were. The large plots of land, marked by a lot of greenery, made the newly opened settlement areas a coveted residential area at the gates of Spandau and nearby Berlin.

1st April 1923: The place name Falkensee arises. From Falkenhagen and Seegefeld the new community Falkensee is being built.

April 1, 1927: incorporation of the manor Seegefeld, with the oldest colony Neufinkenkrug.

October 1, 1928: Incorporation of the forest estate Damsbrück, with the colony Falkenhöh and the settlement "Alter Finkenkrug".

Foto: Archiv Museum Falkensee

Ernst Freimuth was since 1912 the first full-time community leader of the community Falkenhagen. After the merger of the villages Falkenhagen and Seegefeld (1923) he was also the first mayor of the new community Falkensee. During his tenure important decisions were made for the development of infrastructure and the development of additional land for settlement construction.

He remained in office until the end of 1933. The Freimuthstraße opposite the town hall was named after him.

Foto: Stadt Falkensee

From 1943, one of the largest satellite camps of the concentration camp Sachsenhausen was built on the eastern edge of Falkensee. In ten blocks, the prisoners' housing barracks, lived up to 2,500 male prisoners from almost all European nations. They were under inhuman conditions for forced labor in the near

Demag plant, which later in the Alkett GmbH, forced to the production of war weapons.

In April 1945, the prisoners resisted the evacuation order.

After the guards had left their posts, the prisoners received their Soviet liberators on 25/26 April 1945 and left the camp "free to the gate".

The Falkensee-based armaments factories were dismantled as reparations to the Soviet Union until 1949. The former camp area with parts of the existing original buildings is a historical park of the city Falkensee a memorial place for the victims of the national socialism.

On the site of the former concentration camp satellite camp, in the former prisoner barracks, the largest quarantine warehouse in the eastern Havelland was established from summer 1945. Many refugees from the eastern territories, parents without children and returning prisoner of war soldiers found here admission and a first medical care.

The population increased in the following years to 31,000 inhabitants.

Only years later did this situation relax with a prescribed immigration stop.

In 1951, after decades of planning, Falkensee was connected to the S-Bahn Berlin network. The rapid-transit railway ended at today's station Falkensee. The Finkenkrug station was also built as a S-Bahn station, but no longer connected to the S-Bahn network.

The community Falkensee lost between 1945 and 1961 a large part of the population. Many "Ausgebomte" moved back to the new apartments built in Berlin. War refugees moved on and many "Urfalkenseer" moved out of fear of feared restrictions in the western sectors of the city of Berlin.

With the construction of the Berlin Wall on August 13, 1961, the lifeline from Falkensee to Berlin was cut. As a result, Falkensee lost its locational advantage as a Berlin suburban community and now existed in the "shadow" of the walled-in West Berlin as a relatively large city distant community on. Many falconers lost Falkenseer not only their work on this day, but also the family contact with the relatives in "West Berlin".

After a spectacular breakthrough of the border fortification in Albrechtshof station on December 5, 1961 with a passenger train with steamlock on the then not yet dismantled tracks, the long-distance railway tracks of the Hamburger Bahn were dismantled.

A few weeks after the Wall was built, the municipality of Falkensee was granted city rights. The award document dates from October 7, 1961, the twelfth "National Holiday of the GDR," and is on display in the Museum and Falkensee Museum.

With the city law was from the "largest rural community in Europe" a rather small East German city.

Foto: Steffen Hinz

Since Falkensee emerged from the wall shadow in 1989 with the peaceful revolution in the GDR and the fall of the Berlin Wall and the subsequent reunification of Germany, the city is experiencing a construction boom and population growth, which accelerated the growth of the former rural community in the 1920s and 30s even better in the last century. This development was stopped at that time by war and wall construction and could be continued only in the 1990er years. Large-scale housing construction in the form of terraced houses, apartment blocks and townhouses was created by the "Gartenstadt Falkenhöh", the "Parkstadt" in the residential area Finkenkrug or "Seegefeld-Ost." For many newcomers, the many possibilities are still attractive To build a detached house on previously undeveloped land in mature residential streets.

Falkensee is a young city in every respect. Only in 1961 she got the city rights. But not only that makes her so youthful. With the immigration settle and settle above all young families and those can Falkensee also offer a lot. With 24 facilities and a wide range of maternity services, the city has a dense network of care. Three elementary schools have been newly built since the fall of the Wall, other schools have been completely refurbished, yet Falkensee is not satisfied with that: in the coming years, day care centers and schools will also be brought up to date.

Foto: Steffen Hinz

But also for older people Falkensee is an attractive city. Not a few prefer to retire at retirement age because their children live here. There are various age-appropriate forms of accommodation and many clubs and organizations that offer leisure activities for seniors. A rich cultural and sports landscape offers something for everyone.

Just beyond the western gates of Berlin begins Havelland. This is felt everywhere in his biggest city. The Falkenhagener and the New Lake, the Lindenweiher and the Schlaggraben, the adjacent Bredower Forst, the cozy residential area Waldheim as well as the many green areas make the city.