Alexanderplatz

This guide to Alexanderplatz in Berlin centers on the World Clock, the spinning aluminum column East German artist Erich John built in 1969 using a motor borrowed from a Trabant car. It follows what the clock's rotating list of world cities meant to East Berliners who could read the hour in places they were never allowed to visit, and traces the square's role as a gathering point through the tense autumn of 1989, including a mass arrest on the regime's fortieth anniversary. Listen for how a display meant to celebrate the state became a spot people used against it.