Liberty Bell presented in Berlin

In the presence of hundreds of thousands of Berliners the US military governor Lucius D. Clay presents the city with a „Liberty Bell“ which finds its home in the tower of Schoeneberg City Hall. Its purpose is to memorialize the allied Air Lift during the Berlin Blockade from June of 1948 until May of 1949.

Source: sujet.design Installation of the liberty bell in the tower of Schoeneberg City Hall

Before that the bell, which was cast in England, travelled through 26 American states on a fund-raising tour. 17 million Americans followed Clay’s call to a „Crusade for the Freedom of the Committee for a Free Europe“ and signed a „freedom oath“. As the bell rings this oath will subsequently read every Sunday on the “Radio in the American Sector” of Berlin (RIAS). Its text reads as follows: „I believe in the inviolability and the dignity of the individual. I believe that God granted all men an equal right to liberty. I pledge to resist tyranny and any attack on liberty wherever it may arise.“