Fly Mountain

Today, the Fliegeberg in today's Berlin district of Lichterfelde is still a popular destination for friends and admirers of the aviation pioneer Otto Lilienthal. The Fliegeberg is part of the Lilienthal Park, which is designated as a Berlin garden monument.

On the site of a nearby brickyard, Lilienthal had a 15m high mountain heaped up in 1894. From here he undertook together with his brother and some coworkers more than 2000 flight experiments. He explored the flight suitability of his self-built flying machines and could glide with them up to 80 meters far.

On August 9, 1896, Otto Lilienthal crashed during a flight attempt in the Rhinow mountains. He injured himself so badly that he died a day later as a result of the crash.

After the brickworks closed in 1897, the site was turned into a park, and the clay pit was transformed into a carp pond. On top of the Fliegeberg a viewing pavilion was built, originally there was a shed of Lilienthal.

From 1928 to 1933, the Lilienthalpark were redesigned according to the designs of the then Steglitzer city building council Fritz Freymüller and the garden architect Paul Eschenbach. The overgrown Fliegeberg was cleared, got a terrace-like gradation, on the summit a columned hall was erected as a memorial in honor of Otto Lilienthal.

In the small columned hall was a bronze globe, in which important flight lines were engraved. It was melted down during the Second World War. In 1990, the park was restored and the bronze globe was replaced, unfortunately without the engraved flight lines.

Since 2006, the park grounds have hosted the annual Fliegefest. At the Fliegefest 2010 an information stele about the work of Otto Lilienthal and the history of the Fliegeberg was inaugurated.