Historic sacks

Flour sacks can testify to great historical events. Two flour sacks from the immediate post-war period tell of the Berlin Airlift, when the Western sectors of the city that had been isolated by Soviet Russia were supplied with food solely along three air corridors in an unprecedented campaign organized jointly by the American and British forces. A documentary film from that time explains the facts.

Sometimes sacks reappear that are associated with the fate of individuals. Such a sack was donated to the museum by Mrs. Berwald in 2008. It was in bags like this that her mother, who owned the mill Hoffstädter Mühle near Deutsch Krone (now in Poland), exchanged flour for “real” coffee with soldiers on leave from the front. This was the only sack that survived – because a war veteran sent it back to her decades later.