West of the Wall West of the Wall "West of the Wall" is a 1962 song written by Wayne Shanklin, which was recorded as a single by Toni Fisher. The song tells of the sadness of lovers separated by the Berlin Wall which divided Germany into East and West at the time, and expresses the hope that the wall will soon fall. The Berlin Wall had been constructed in 1961, and in fact did not fall until 1989. The song was a Top 40 hit for Toni Fisher in the United States, where it reached #37 on the "Billboard" Hot 100 in July 1962.
Heddon-on-the-Wall where the name means 'Hidda's pasture'. A Roman milecastle ('Milecastle 12') was located at the site of the present-day village, under what is now Town Farm, but no traces of it are currently visible. Prior to the 1960s, Heddon-on-the-Wall was a small village with an economy based strongly on traditional industry including farming and coal mining. Large-scale coal mining close to the village began in the late 1950s with the opening of the Bays Leap, a opencast mine site located a short distance north of Heddon-on-the-Wall. The site supported seven coal seams at its peak, and evidence was found of