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Poor West Germany

Or: A Tale of Two Cities

Katja Hoyer's avatar
Katja Hoyer
Jul 26, 2026
∙ Paid
View of Essen’s skyline from the Zollverein Coal Mine. Img: Rainer Halama, CC-BY-SA-2.5.

When my train pulled into Essen on Tuesday, I had no idea what to expect. As a historian, I associate this cit…

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