Trams in Nordhausen

Nordhausen (pronounced [ˈnɔʁtˌhaʊ̯zn̩] ) is a city in Thuringia, Germany. It is the capital of the Nordhausen district and the urban centre of northern Thuringia and the southern Harz region; its population is 42,000. Nordhausen is located approximately 60 km (37 miles) north of Erfurt, 80 km (50 miles) west of Halle, 85 km (53 miles) south of Braunschweig and 60 km (37 miles) east of Göttingen. Nordhausen was first mentioned in records in the year 927 and became one of the most important cities in central Germany during the later Middle Ages. The city is situated on the Zorge river, a tributary of the Helme within the fertile region of Goldene Aue (golden floodplain) at the southern edge of the Harz mountains. In the early 13th century, it became a free imperial city, so that it was an independent and republican self-ruled member of the Holy Roman Empire. Due to its long-distance trade, Nordhausen was prosperous and influential, with a population of 8,000 around 1500. It was the third-largest city in Thuringia after Erfurt, today's capital, and Mühlhausen, the other free imperial city in the land. Nordhausen was once known for its tobacco industry and is still known for its distilled spirit, Nordhäuser Doppelkorn. Industrialization accompanied railway construction that linked the cities to major markets in the mid-19th century. In the late 19th century, narrow-gauge railways were constructed in this region through the Harz mountains. In December 1898 the Nordhausen-Wernigerode Railway Company (Nordhausen-Wernigeroder Eisenbahn-Gesellschaft) or NWE added a line, with the full network operating by 1899. The Harz Narrow Gauge Railways are maintained today by local authorities and frequented primarily by tourists. In the early 20th century, this became a centre of the engineering and arms industries. During World War II, the Nazi German government established and operated the nearby KZ Mittelbau-Dora concentration camp, where 60,000 forced labourers had to work in the arms industry. They were prisoners of war and persons from occupied territories. Some 20,000 persons died because of the bad conditions. In April 1945, most of the city was destroyed by Royal Air Force bombings, resulting in 8,800 casualties (more than 20% of the population). Most of the historic buildings in the city were destroyed; it suffered the most damage during the war of any city in Thuringia. A week later the United States troops occupied the city, followed weeks later by the Soviet Red Army. The city was within the Soviet zone of occupation, and later the territory was known as East Germany. Hundreds of German scientists and their families from Nordhausen were among thousands deported to the Soviet Union after the war to work on advanced rocket and other arms engineering projects. Nordhausen is the birthplace of the mathematician Oswald Teichmüller, known for his groundbreaking work on the Teichmüller spaces – which were named after him. It is the site of the Nordhausen University of Applied Sciences (Fachhochschule Nordhausen), founded in 1997 after the reunification of Germany. The university has 2,500 students.

Amtsgericht Nordhausen is the District Court of Nordhausen and one of 23 district courts in Thuringia, Germany. Established in 1879, it has approximately 60 employees, including judges. The jurisdiction of the district court of Nordhausen includes the core city of Nordhausen, Ellrich and Bleicherode, the management communities of Goldene Aue and Hohnstein/Südharz, the unified communities of Werther and Hohenstein, and the community of Sollstedt.

Boelcke-Kaserne concentration camp (transl. Boelcke Barracks; also Nordhausen) was a subcamp of the Mittelbau-Dora concentration camp complex where prisoners were left to die after they became unable to work. It was located inside a former Luftwaffe barracks complex in Nordhausen, Thuringia, Germany, adjacent to several pre-existing forced labor camps. During its three-month existence, about 6,000 prisoners passed through the camp and almost 3,000 died there under "indescribable" conditions. More than a thousand prisoners were killed during the bombing of Nordhausen by the Royal Air Force on 3–4 April 1945. Their corpses were found by the US Army units that liberated the camp on 11 April. Photographs and newsreel footage of the camp were reported internationally and made Nordhausen notorious in many parts of the world.

The Nordhausen University of Applied Sciences (German: Hochschule Nordhausen) is located in Nordhausen, Thuringia, Germany. Established in 1997 after reunification of Germany, as of 2022 the Hochschule has 2,035 students enrolled and 52 professors. It offers Bachelor's and Master's degrees in business administration, public management, and business engineering, among others. External links Official website

Nordhausen is a Kreis (district) in the north of Thuringia, Germany. Neighboring districts are (from the north clockwise): Harz and Mansfeld-Südharz in Saxony-Anhalt; Kyffhäuserkreis and Eichsfeld in Thuringia; and Göttingen and Goslar in Lower Saxony.

Harzungen is a village and a former municipality in the district of Nordhausen, in Thuringia, Germany. Since July 2018, it is part of the municipality Harztor. During World War II a concentration camp with 4000 inmates was built in this city. It was a subcamp of Mittelbau-Dora who was itself a subcamp of the Buchenwald concentration camp.

Petersdorf is a former municipality in the district of Nordhausen, in Thuringia, Germany. Since 1 December 2007, it is part of the town Nordhausen.

Mittelwerk ([ˈmɪtl̩.vɛʁk]; German for "Central Works") was a German World War II factory built underground in the Kohnstein to avoid Allied bombing. It used slave labor from the Mittelbau-Dora concentration camp to produce V-2 ballistic missiles, V-1 flying bombs, and other weapons.

Werther is a municipality in the district of Nordhausen, in Thuringia, Germany.

Mittelbau-Dora (also Dora-Mittelbau and Nordhausen-Dora) was a Nazi concentration camp located near Nordhausen in Thuringia, Germany. It was established in late summer 1943 as a subcamp of Buchenwald concentration camp, supplying slave labour from many Eastern countries occupied by Germany (including evacuated survivors of eastern extermination camps), for extending the nearby tunnels in the Kohnstein and for manufacturing the V-2 rocket and the V-1 flying bomb. In the summer of 1944, Mittelbau became an independent concentration camp with numerous subcamps of its own. In 1945, most of the surviving inmates were sent on death marches or crammed in trains of box-cars by the SS. On 11 April 1945, US troops freed the remaining prisoners. The inmates at Dora-Mittelbau were treated in a brutal and inhumane manner, working 14-hour days and being denied access to basic hygiene, beds, and adequate rations. Around one in three of the roughly 60,000 prisoners who were sent to Dora-Mittelbau died. Today, the site hosts a memorial and museum.

The Kohnstein is a hill in Thuringia, Germany, 2 kilometres southwest of the village of Niedersachswerfen and 3 kilometres northwest of the centre of the town of Nordhausen. Gypsum mining created tunnels in the hill that were later used as a fuel/chemical depot and for Nazi Germany factories, including the Mittelwerk V-2 rocket factory that used Mittelbau-Dora slave labour.

Rüdigsdorf Switzerland (German: Rüdigsdorfer Schweiz) is a range of hills up to 350.1 m above sea level (NN) near the village of Rüdigsdorf in the district of Nordhausen in the German state of Thuringia. The landscape is the last intact gypsum karst region in the state and has therefore been designated by the EU as a protected area. It is one of the smallest "little Switzerlands" in Germany. The majority of the area is a nature reserve.