John Ahouse, who frequently corresponds with BWTAS about items in the USA mentioned a small but attractive water tower he had seen in Schwante, Germany.
Image source
Image source
Schwante is a small town about 15 km north of Berlin. It possesses a "palace" (more of a country house), a Dutch-type windmill, a church and this water tower among its modest sights. Schwante's brief fame came about when human rights protesters gathered there in October 1989 to found an independent political party, the SDP. As this was clearly illegal under the monolithic Communist regime, they were taking their chances. Their endeavour survived the fall of the Berlin Wall in November, however, and became the East German version of the SPD in the big political shakeout occurring over the next nine months.
Chancellor Helmut Kohl's CDU, the party in power in West Germany, drubbed all the left-leaning parties and splinter parties in the first free all-German elections that next year by promising prosperity for all. Thus the SDP was short-lived though the traditional all-German SPD is the #2 party in the Bundestag. Having played a role in the nascent freedom and human rights movement in the GDR is a good thing, nevertheless, to be famous for.
Local information (in German)
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