Sportpalast

Berlin Sportpalast (built 1910, demolished 1973) was a multi-purpose indoor arena located in the Schöneberg section of Berlin, Germany. Depending on the type of event and seating configuration, the Sportpalast could hold up to 14,000 people and was for a time the biggest meeting hall in Berlin. The Sportpalast is most known for speeches and rallies that took place during the Third Reich, particularly Nazi Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels's 1943 "Total War" speech.

Built at Potsdamer Straße 172, principally as an indoor ice rink for ice hockey and skating events, the Sportpalast was a sensation at the time of its opening in November 1910, and was at the time the largest such enclosed skating facility in the world. In later years, the Sportpalast also hosted non-winter sporting events such as six-day bicycle races and professional boxing matches in which well-known German boxer Max Schmeling fought. The Sportpalast was also used as a meeting hall for a variety of events, including political rallies and the Bockbierfest (Bock beer festival) with Bavarian bands, dancing, and roasted meat.

During the tumultuous years of the Weimar Republic in the '20s and early '30s, the Sportpalast was used for the mass meetings of the major German political parties; within its walls, speakers from the Social Democrats, Communists and National Socialists outlined their programs and strategies to capacity crowds.

Even after the Nazi Party gained power in 1933 and outlawed the other German political parties, the Sportpalast continued to be a popular venue for party rallies and important speeches by party leaders, including Adolf Hitler and Goebbels. Because of the size and propaganda potential of the Sportpalast, Goebbels is said to have labeled the hall as Unsere große politische Tribüne — "our big political grandstand".

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