WICHITA, Kansas (KSN) -- As the world gets ready to celebrate the crumbling of the Berlin Wall, Wichita can lay claim to being one of the few places in the United States with a large slab of it on display.
The Berlin Wall fell on November 9, 1989 signifying the end of the Cold War.
You can see a 12-foot tall, 4-1/2 ton chunk of it at the Museum of World Treasures in Old Town.
The slab of concrete was brought to Wichita in 2005 after the "Berlin Brats" purchased it on Ebay for $5,000. The group is made up of children of U.S. forces stationed in Berlin.
"They did a background check to make certain that this is actually an authentic part of the wall - which they did get documentation for," said Joe Condrill, president of Overseas Brats. "Then they had a grant that allowed them to buy the wall."
The slab in Wichita is covered with graffiti on the side facing West Berlin. The other side that faced communist controlled East Berlin is clean, gray concrete. Anyone who tried to scale the wall faced arrest or even death.
"Guards everywhere with machine guns and rifles ready to kill anybody that was trying to get away," remembered Museum founder Jon Kardatzke from a trip to Berlin in 1963. "And they had already killed a lot. So we went along the wall and saw a lot of wreaths for people for people who had been killed trying to get away."
The Museum of World Treasures will be open on the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. Condrill will be available to answer questions about the wall from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.
