Schneidemühl's bygone days
An early view of the
railway
station, mid-19th century, before its enlargement.
Schneidemühl's position on the rail line Berlin - Königsberg
facilitated much commerce.
In years to come Schneidemühl became an important railway hub and
a strategic target which,
during the last phases of the Second World War, caused intense fighting.
1900 —
fin-de-siècle Schneidemühl — the Jewish owned Brieger's
elegant hotel,
theater and concert house, located on Neuer Markt 10 was one of the
oldest
venues
of this type in Schneidemühl and a favorite watering hole for
Jewish and
Gentile clientele alike.
During the war years of 1914-18 the hall served as emergency hospital.
Hotel
de Rome
on Neuer Markt 21 was owned
by Eduard
Zander in the 1890s.
Although less than the pretentious
name conjures up,
this was another of
Schneidemühl’s favorite meeting places.
Facing
the viewer is the old Zeughaus, the armory, where
Posenerstrasse
ended
to make a sharp turn to the left
before the street was extended in the
late 1880s.
Hill’s Hotel on the right, owned by Lesser
Hirsch in the 1890s,
was a popular venue for the local
military at the turn of the 19th
century.
One
of the
many old
town mills
on
Mühlenstrasse 22, built in 1804
in the same locale where
there used to stand a
mill since days immemorial.
This house was torn down in
1928 and, the only reminder
of Schneidemühl's
raison d'être was the
name of the street — Mühlenstrasse.
Mühlenstrasse corner
of
Wasserstrasse, a scene of ca. 1870 that breathes
village peace and quiet. The
house in the foreground, built of
clay and timber,
used to be owned in
1896 by the city's well-known
photographer Oskar
Merkel.
The
first
automobile in Schneidemühl, ca. 1895,
aroused much excitement,
curiosity, rejection and, fear.
The proud owner was
Schneidemühl's popular
painter and photographer Theophil
Graszynski.
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Copyright ©
2006-2009
Peter Simonstein Cullman