Artifact Friday: Checkpoint Charlie Mug

It’s a strange feeling, looking back and seeing our sworn enemies as allies. Throughout the Cold War, the two global powers challenged each other’s influence in the world. This duel of titans occurred in every corner of the globe, but few are as iconic as Checkpoint Charlie. It was at this small spot in Berlin that American and Soviet tanks faced off against one another and waited to see who would be the ones to fire the first shot of World War III.

Instead, they slowly backed away from each other, and an uneasy peace was restored. In our collection is a coffee mug from Checkpoint Charlie that reads, “you are leaving the American sector,” in English, German, Russian, and French. This same sign was plastered all over Checkpoint Charlie, not just as a notice, but a warning. However, prior to the decades of fear and violence of the Cold War, the Soviet Union and United States were allies.

On this day, April 25, 1945, soldiers of the Soviet Union and United States met at the Elbe River near the German town of Torgau. This monumental moment signified the fall of Nazi Germany as the two fronts of World War II finally linked together. These soldiers spent some time exchanging gifts and stories with the sound knowledge that the war was coming to a long-awaited end. Flags and uniform patches were traded, as is a long-running military tradition.

Elbe Day would never be officially recognized as a holiday by either nation due to following conflicts, and it would be considered quite a stretch to consider the Soviet Union and United States friends even prior to the Cold War, but for that one day in a war-torn continent, the brave soldiers meeting each other across the Elbe River saw one another as brothers, and that is a moment worth remembering.