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The zookeeper's war : an incredible true story from the Cold War / by J.W. Mohnhaupt.

By: Material type: TextTextLanguage: English Original language: German Series: Thorndike Press large print nonfiction seriesPublisher: Waterville, Maine : Thorndike Press, 2020Edition: Large print editionDescription: 377 pages (large print) ; 23 cmContent type:
  • text
Media type:
  • unmediated
Carrier type:
  • volume
ISBN:
  • 9781432879181
  • 1432879189
Uniform titles:
  • Zoo der Anderen. English
Subject(s): Genre/Form: Summary: Living in West Berlin in the 1960s often felt like living in a zoo, everyone packed together behind a wall, with the world always watching. On the other side of the Iron Curtain, the East Berlin zoo was spacious and lush, a socialist utopia where everything was perfectly planned...and then rarely successfully finished. Berlin's two zoos quickly became symbols of the divided city's two halves. And so no one was terribly surprised when the head zookeepers on either side started an animal arms race--rather than stockpiling nuclear warheads, competing to have the most pandas and hippos. Soon, state funds were being quietly diverted to give these new animals lavish welcomes worthy of visiting dignitaries. West German presidential candidates were talking about zoo policy on the campaign trail. And eventually politicians on both side of the Wall became convinced that if their zoo were proved to be inferior, then that would mean their country's whole ideology was too.
Holdings
Item type Home library Collection Call number Materials specified Status Date due Barcode Item holds
Large Print Book Large Print Book Main Library Large Print NonFiction 590.7343 M698 Available 33111010401160
Total holds: 0

"Originally published in 2017 in Germany as Der Zoo der Anderen by Carl Hanser Verlag."

Includes bibliographical references.

Living in West Berlin in the 1960s often felt like living in a zoo, everyone packed together behind a wall, with the world always watching. On the other side of the Iron Curtain, the East Berlin zoo was spacious and lush, a socialist utopia where everything was perfectly planned...and then rarely successfully finished. Berlin's two zoos quickly became symbols of the divided city's two halves. And so no one was terribly surprised when the head zookeepers on either side started an animal arms race--rather than stockpiling nuclear warheads, competing to have the most pandas and hippos. Soon, state funds were being quietly diverted to give these new animals lavish welcomes worthy of visiting dignitaries. West German presidential candidates were talking about zoo policy on the campaign trail. And eventually politicians on both side of the Wall became convinced that if their zoo were proved to be inferior, then that would mean their country's whole ideology was too.

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