Berlin Wall youngsters. Another border crossing to the south may have been opened earlier. An account by Heinz Schäfer indicates that he also acted independently and ordered the opening of the gate at Waltersdorf-Rudow a couple of hours earlier. This may explain reports of East Berliners appearing in West Berlin earlier than the opening of the Bornholmer Straße border crossing. The fall of the Berlin Wall () began the evening of 9 November 1989 and continued over the following days and weeks, with people nicknamed (wall woodpeckers) using various tools to chip off souvenirs, demolishing lengthy parts in the process, and creating
Berlin Wall 22 months after the erection of the Berlin Wall, U.S. President John F. Kennedy visited West Berlin. Speaking from a platform erected on the steps of Rathaus Schöneberg for an audience of 450,000 he declared in his "Ich bin ein Berliner" speech the support of the United States for West Germany and the people of West Berlin in particular: The message was aimed as much at the Soviets as it was at Berliners and was a clear statement of U.S. policy in the wake of the construction of the Berlin Wall. The speech is considered one of Kennedy's best, both