Many stories about Mühlenstraße from before the construction of the Berlin Wall in 1961 still remain untold. Although no structural traces of that time survive, historical photographs and documents provide clues to those who once lived and worked there.
Rubber Goods from Mühlenstraße – Colonialism on Mühlenstraße
One of the first German gutta-percha factories was established in 1843 at Mühlenstraße no. 70/71 (the two buildings seen on the left edge of the aerial photograph). The company, founded by W. Eliot, merged with other companies in 1870 to form the Berlin rubber goods factory. It, in turn, became the Vereinigte Berlin-Frankfurter Gummiwarenfabrik in 1886 and, the Veritas Gummiwaren AG in 1929. In 1927, the property on Mühlenstraße was sold and the company headquarters moved to Lichterfelde. "Veritas" joined forces with "IG Farben" to develop a new synthetic rubber. The company began specializing in tire production and is still active in this field.
Gutta-percha and caoutchouc were essential materials in the production of rubber. Rubber, in turn, was a key raw material in the development of Germany’s industry. It was used in the sheathing of electric cables and drive belts, in rubber sealing rings and car tires. Many important products in the industrialization and motorization process were made of rubber or gutta-percha.
Both of these raw materials were derived from the milky sap of tropical plants and was only available outside of Europe. Germany was able to obtain this raw material cheaply – from its own colonies in East Africa—including today's Cameroon, Tanzania and Rwanda—as well as from other European colonies. The people in South America and Africa were subjected to terror and violence and forced to extract the silky white liquid from trees. The profits reaped from this key raw material went to the European middlemen and to the companies that made rubber products, which included the factory on Mühlenstraße.