1. Die Steinmühle
Die Steinmühle wurde 1303 als Getreidemühle von den Zisterziensermönchen aus dem Kloster Zinn erbaut und von diesen betrieben. Bis 1766 wurde die Mühle als Getreidemühle genutzt, bis der damalige Mühlenmeister eine Genehmigung zur Anlegung einer Schneidemühle (Sägewerk) erhielt.
1845 wurde sie wieder abgerissen und danach als Ölmühle wiederaufgebaut. Ende 19. Jahrhunderts wurde auf Dampfkraft erweitert und die Mühle zur Strohpapierstoff-Fabrik umgebaut. Sie wurde auch weiter als Dampfmühle genutzt. 1918 firmiert die Mühle als „G. Thiele Steinmühle“. Inhaber war Emil Gericke, der Schwiegersohn von G.Thiele. 1934 wurde die Dampfmaschine durch einen Motor ersetzt und die Mühle vergrößert.
Ostwall - fortress front Oder-Warthe-Bogen
The Oder-Warthe-Bogen fortress front, popularly known as the Ostwall, was a heavily fortified line of defense built by the German Reich in mid-1934, which runs about 120 km east of Berlin from the river Warthe in the north to the Oder in the south. We booked the day tour with Christel Fokken , who was also a competent guide on site.
Construction of this facility could begin at this early point in time (1934), as the German Reich was not subject to any contractual restrictions in the east, as was the case in the west with the Treaty of Versailles.
The east wall was planned as 110 km long, fortified area with a depth of two to three kilometers, very similar to what was also carried out a few years later for the Siegfried Line. Some of the bunker constructions are therefore very similar to those of the Siegfried Line, while others are much more extensive. The fortress front consists of numerous bunkers and hydraulic engineering facilities such as dams and moats. Roads that led through the so-called main battlefield were provided with armored barriers, swing bridges and tipping roller bridges - tipping roller bridges made it possible to tilt the bridge body and roll it into a space below the road.
Since the political situation had changed in 1939 so that the protection of the imperial border to the west was classified as more urgent, the expansion of the fortress front Oder-Warthe-Bogen was stopped. Fortress construction personnel and armored components were diverted to the west in favor of an accelerated expansion of the western wall. Of the planned 160 structures, only around 60 were completed. With the construction of the Atlantic Wall, weapons and communications equipment began to be dismantled in 1942. In the underground system there are train stations, workshops, machine rooms and barracks. The total length of the underground system is around 32 km.
In 1944 the war situation made it necessary to restore the defensive capabilities of the fortress front. Until January 1945, for example, as part of the Barthold company and the Reich Labor Service, field positions were excavated, wire obstacles and a number of ring stands were erected. This made it possible to build a continuous fire front for machine guns. On January 28, 1945, the first attack on the central section took place, which the Red Army broke through after three days. Some tank factories were "ignored" by the Red Army; Volkssturm men entrenched there were only asked to surrender between April and May. Because not everyone followed the instructions, the tank works were destroyed without being cleared.
After the Second World War, the east wall was first used by the Red Army and later by the Polish Army. In 1957 the military use ended and the east wall was forgotten.
