Talk:Volkshalle
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[edit] Hoawbout a picture?
Anyone have a picturew of this thing? any 3-d modeling perhaps? pretty epic visual, i'll bet. Albeit technically dastardly.
[edit] Nordic Theory
I changed the link in the first paragraph from "Nordic" > "Northern Europe" to < "Nordic Theory" because Hitler did not mean Skandinavia when referring to nordic but the "Nordic Race" in the way it is explained on the Wikipedia page "Nordic Theory". 87.187.41.218 (talk) 15:30, 28 November 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Revert Albert Speer Quote
- I believe Albert Speer quote is quite relevant to the topic. As he was the architect in charge of constructing the Volkshalle, he has first hand knowledge of it. This quote is certainly historically significant and should stay, these are my reasons for the revision. In addition, it is against Wiki rules to do major Edits of peoples work, where one person deletes a huge amount of work like that. WritersCramp 22:09, 6 August 2005 (UTC)
- All work can be edited by anyone. We can't use great quotes like that as it's far too much for fair use/fair dealing. Wikipedia:Fair use gives more information, but mainly on images. Secretlondon 14:41, 10 August 2005 (UTC)
- I've fished the quotation out from the history and pasted it below. I suggest you pick out the interesting facts and short quotations into the article and write them up in the article. --Dtcdthingy 20:31, 28 August 2005 (UTC)
[edit] Albert Speer on the Volkshalle (removed from article)
In Albert Speer's book Inside The Third Reich he dedicates much of Chapter 11 to the discussion of the Volkshalle, which he calls 'The Globe'. The most relevant portions of the chapter are transcribed below as they are historically significant.
The buildings which were intended to frame the future Adolf Hitler Platz lay in the shadow of the great domed hall. But as if Hitler wanted by architecture alone to denigrate the whole process of popular representation, the hall had a volumne fifty times greater than the proposed Reichstag building. He had asked me to work out the designs for this hall as early as the summer of 1936. On April 20, 1937, his birthday, I gave him the renderings, ground plans, cross sections and a first model of the building. He was delighted and only quarrelled with my having signed the plans:
- "Developed on the basis of the Führer's ideas."
I was the architect, he said and my contribution to this building must be given greater credit than his sketch of the idea dating from 1925. I stuck to this formula; however, and Hitler was probably gratified at my refusal to claim authorship for this building. Partial models were prepared from the plans and in 1939 a detailed wooden model of the exterior some 10 feet (3 m) high and another model of the interior were made. The floor could be removed in order to test the future effect at eye level. In the course of his many visits to the exhibit Hitler would unfailingly spend a long time contemplating these two models. He would point triumphantly to them as an idea that must have struck his friends fifteen years ago as a fantastic quirk.
- "In those days who was prepared to believe me when I said that this would be built some day!" - Hitler
This structure, the greatest assembly hall in the world ever conceived up to that time, consisted of one vast hall that could hold between one hundred fifty and one hundred eighty thousand people standing. In spite of Hitler's negative attitude toward Himmler's and Rosenberg's mystical notions, the hall was essentially a place of worship. The idea was that over the course of centuries, by tradition and venerability, it would acquire an importance similar to that of St. Peter's Basilica in Rome has for Catholic Christendom. Without some such essentially pseudo-religious background the expenditure for Hitler's central building would have been pointless and incomprehensible.
The round interior was to have the almost inconceivable diameter of 825 feet (251 m). The huge dome was to begin its slightly parabolic curve at a height of 323 feet (98 m) and rise to a height of 726 feet (221 m).
In a sense the Pantheon in Rome had served as our model. The Berlin dome was also to contain a round opening for light, but this opening alone would be 152 feet (46 m) in diameter, larger than the entire dome of the Pantheon (142 feet) and of St. Peter's Basilica (145 feet). The interior would contain 16 times the volumne of St. Peter's Basilica.
The interior appointments were to be as simple as possible. Circling an area 462 feet in diameter, a three tier gallery rose to a height of 100 feet (30 m). A circle of 100 rectangular marble pillars, still almost on a human scale, for they were only eighty feet high, was broken by a recess opposite the entrance. This recess was one hundred and sixty five165rble pedestal 46 feet in height, perched the hall's single sculptural feature: a gilded German eagle with a swastika in its claws. This symbol of sovereignty might be said to be the very fountainhead of Hitler's grand boulevard. Beneath this symbol would be the podium for the Leader of the nation; from this spot he would deliver his messages to the peoples of his future empire. I tried to give this spot suitable emphasis, but here the fatal flaw of architecture that has lost all sense of proportion was revealed. Under that vast dome Hitler dwindled to an optical zero.
From the outside the dome would have loomed against the sky like some green mountain, for it was to be roofed with patinated plates of copper. At its peak we planned a skylight turret 132 feet high, of the lightest possible metal construction. The turret would be crowned by an eagle with swastika.
Optically, the mass of the dome was to have been set off by a series of pillars 66 feet high. I thought this effect would bring things back to scale, undoubtedly a vain hope. The mountainous dome rested upon a granite edifice 244 feet high with sides ten hundred and forty feet long. A delicate frieze, four clustered, fluted pillars on each of the four corners and a colonnade along the front facing the square were to dramatize the size of the enormous cube. Two sculptures each 50 feet high would flank the colonnade. Hitler had already decided on the subjects of these sculptures when we were preparing our first sketches of the building. One would represent Atlas bearing the vault of the heavens, the other Tellus supporting the globe of the world. The spheres representing sky and earth were to be enamel coated with constellations and continents traced in gold.
The volumne of this structure amounted to almost 27.5 million cubic yards (21,000,000 m³); the capital in Washington, D.C., would have been contained many times in such a mass. These were dimensions of an inflationary sort.
Yet the hall was by no means an insane project, which could in fact never be executed. Our plans did not belong to that super grandiose category envisioned by Claude Nicolas Ledoux as the swan song of the Bourbon dynasty of France, or by Etienne L. Boullée to glorify the Revolution projects which were never meant to be carried out. Their scale, however, was by no means vaster than Hitler's. But we were seriously going ahead with our plans. As early as 1939 many old buildings in the vicinity of the Reichstag were razed to make room for our Great Hall and the other buildings that were to surround the future Adolf Hitler Platz. The character of the underlying soil was studied. Detailed drawings were prepared and models built. Millions of marks were spent on granite for the exterior. Nor were the purchases confined to Germany. Despite the shortage of foreign exchange, Hitler had orders placed with quarries in southern Sweden and Finland. Like all the other edifices on Hitler's long grand boulevard, the great hall was also scheduled to be completed in eleven years, by 1950. Since the hall would take longer to build than all the rest, the ceremonial cornerstone laying was set for 1940.
Technically, there was no special problem in constructing a dome over 800 feet in diameter. The bridge buildings of the thirties had no difficulty with similar spans of steel or reinforced concrete. Leading German engineers had even calculated that it would be possible to build a massive vault with such a span. In keeping with my Theory of Ruin Value I would rather have eschewed the use of steel; but in this case Hitler expressed doubts.
- "You know, an aerial bomb might strike the dome and damage the vaulting. If there were danger of collapse, how would you go about making repairs?"…Hitler
He was right and we therefore had a steel skeleton constructed, from which the inner shell of the dome would be suspended. The walls, however, were to be of solid stone like the Nuremberg buildings. Their weight, along with that of the dome, would exert tremendous pressure and would demand an enormous concrete footing, which would have had a content of 3.9 million cubic yards (3,000,000 m³). According to our calculations, this would sink only a few centimetres into the sandy soil; but to test this, a sample section was built near Berlin. Except for drawings and photographs of models, it is the only thing that has remained of the projected structure.
In the course of the planning I had gone to see St. Peter's Basilica in Rome. It was rather dashing for me to realize that its size had little to do with the impression it creates. In work on such a scale, I saw, effectiveness is no longer proportionate to the size of the building. I began to be afraid that our great hall would turn out disappointingly.
Ministerial Councillor Knipfer, who was in charge of air-raid protection in the Reich Air Ministry, had heard rumours about this gigantic structure. He had just issued directives providing that all future buildings be as widely dispersed as possible in order to diminish the effect of air raids. Now, here in the centre of the city and of the Reich, a building was to be erected, which would tower above low clouds and act as an ideal navigational guide to enemy bombers. It would be virtually a signpost for the government centre. I mentioned these considerations to Hitler. But he was sanguine.
- "Goering has assured me, that no enemy plane will enter Germany. We will not let that sort of thing stand in the way of our plans." - Hitler
Hitler was obsessed with the idea for this dome building. We had already drawn up our designs when he heard that the Soviet Union was also planning an enormous assembly building in Moscow in honour of Lenin. He was deeply irked, feeling himself cheated of the glory of building the tallest monumental structure in the world. Along with this was an intense chagrin that he could not make Stalin stop by a simple command. But he finally consoled himself with the thought that his building would remain unique.
- "What does one skyscraper more or less amount to, a little higher or a little lower. The great thing about our building will be the dome!"…Hitler
After the war with the Soviet Union had begun, I now and then saw evidence that the idea of Moscow's rival building had preyed on Hitler's mind more than he had been willing to admit.
- "Now, this will be the end of their building for good and all."…Hitler
The domed hall was to be surrounded on three sides by water, which would reflect it and enhance its effect. For this purpose we intended to widen the Spree river into a kind of lake.
One day in early summer of 1939, he pointed to the German eagle with the swastika in its claws, which was to crown the dome 957 feet in the air.
- "That has to be changed. Instead of the swastika, the eagle is to be perched above the globe. To crown this greatest building in the world the eagle must stand above the globe." - Hitler
There are photos of the models in which this revision is plainly to be seen.
A few months later the Second World War began.
As late as May 8, 1943, Joseph Goebbels noted in his diary:
- "The Fuehrer expresses his unshakable conviction that the Reich will one day rule all of Europe. We will have to survive a great many conflicts, but they will doubtless lead to the most glorious triumphs. And from then on the road to world domination is practically spread out before us. For whoever rules Europe will be able to seize the leadership of the world."…Goebbels
–- Schwerbelastungskoerper --
This shouldn't actually be here at all. The SBK was built to test the ground before the building og the Triumphbogen, the giant triumphal arch Hitler wanted to build. The Volkshalle's weight would have been spread over a large area and there wasn't such a danger of it sinking, but the arch would have exerted much greater pressure on the ground.
