Charlottenburg

Charlottenburg, a town of Germany, in the kingdom of Prussia, on the Spree, lying immediately west of Berlin, of which it forms practically the entire western suburb. The earlier name of the town was Lietzenburg. Pop. (1890) 76,859; (1900) 189,290; (1905) 237,231. It is governed by a council of 94 members. The central part of the town is connected with Berlin by a magnificent avenue, the Charlottenburger Chaussee, which runs from the Brandenburger Tor through the whole length of the Tiergarten. Although retaining its own municipal government, Charlottenburg, together with the adjacent suburban towns of Schoneberg and Rixdorf, was included in 1900 in the police district of the capital. The Schloss, built in 1696 for the electress Sophie Charlotte, queen of the elector Frederick, afterwards King Frederick I., after whom the town was named, contains a collection of antiquities and paintings. In the grounds stands a granite mausoleum, the work of Karl Friedrich Schinkel, with beautiful white marble recumbent statues of Frederick William III. and his queen Louise by Christian Daniel Rauch, and also those of the emperor William I. and the empress Augusta by Erdmann Encke. It was in the Schloss that the emperor Frederick III. took over the reins of government in 1888, and here he resided for nearly the whole of his three months’ reign. The town contains an equestrian statue of Frederick. Of public buildings, the famous technical academy and the Kaiser Wilhelm memorial church are referred to in the article Berlin. In Charlottenburg is the Physikalisch-technische Reichsanstalt, a state institution for the carrying out of scientific experiments and measurements, and for testing instruments of precision, materials, &c. It was established in 1886 with money provided by Ernst Werner Siemens. In addition to the famous royal porcelain manufactory, Charlottenburg has many flourishing industries, notably iron-works grouped along the banks of the Spree. Its main thoroughfares are laid out on a spacious plan, while there are many quiet streets containing pretty villas. See F. Schultz, Chronik von Charlottenburg (Charlottenburg, 1888).

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