It is now the beautiful autumn time, time for excursions. Coburg would be a good choice, a city on the outskirts of the Free State, but blessed with fabulous attractions: Veste, Ehrenburg Palace, Hofgarten, State Theater. Maybe you still know all sorts of things about Coburg from school lessons, but a few additional orientations always help. And so it’s just good that the city marketing has a basic brochure ready that can also be downloaded from the Internet.
It’s called “Coburg – discover and experience”, according to its own statement it was put together “05/2022” and comprises a proud 56 pages. Right at the beginning, as it should be, a chronicle is used to familiarize you with essential data. And Coburg really has all sorts of things to offer that even metropolises need not be ashamed of: Luther was there, as was Rückert, the duchy wrote world history.
The fact that in a city the size of Coburg not every timeline date is of indispensable relevance may be a given. On the other hand, there are certainly also enthusiasts who simply want to know when Coburg was able to enjoy the first street lighting (1806) and when exactly the “Zinkenwehr multi-storey car park” was inaugurated (1992).
There are more than six dozen such entries in the brochure chronicle, everything in it, everything on it. A small excerpt from the first half of the 20th century may illustrate this: “1924: Last conversion of the Veste under Duke Carl Eduard according to plans by Bodo Ebhardt. 1929: Opening of the rose garden. 1954: Carl Eduard, Coburg’s last reigning duke, dies. 1962: 100-year celebration of the German Singers’ Association.”
yikes Doesn’t one faintly remember that in between there was something in Coburg that in terms of its historical significance could even come close to the inauguration of a multi-storey car park?
Around 1929: First city with a NSDAP city council majority. Or 1931: First city with a swastika flag at the town hall. 1932: Coburg is the first German city to grant Hitler honorary citizenship. And 1939: Coburg is allowed to call itself “Germany’s first National Socialist city”.
If you call the various numbers of the city administration, one thing is not clear: who put together this original timeline. But other things are: In future new editions, the hole in the timeline should be filled with data. How commendable.