Since February 1999, it has been managed by the "Friends of the International Library e.V." After the capitulation of Germany in May 1945, the Allies divided Germany into four zones. Accordingly, the British occupation army took over west and north-west Germany from the American forces. A year later the Occupation Office founded 10 institutions called “Die Brücke” -- bridging the gap between the
nations at war. In Düsseldorf an educational and cultural centre was installed in the confiscated Carschhaus presenting an enormous amount of cultural events and a library. As Günter Grass writes in the Blechtrommel (Tin Drum): “… in those years I educated myself almost free of cost together with thousands wanting to catch up and to educate themselves, took courses in the Volkshochschule, and became a regular in the British Centre, called ‘Die Brücke’.”
In 1952 e.g. the library offered 145 international periodicals, 43 newspapers, some 20,000 books, and staged 2720 events: lectures, musical performances, theatre, ballet, films, exhibitions, and regular meetings of dozens of international clubs, which were attended by half a million people in that one year. In the course of the 1950s the British required the German authorities to get involved. Interest in the offered facilities waned as competition arose from several other cultural institutions. While most of the other “Brücke” were thus dissolved, in Düsseldorf the town council shared costs and responsibilities in what was renamed the “Anglo-German Cultural Centre Die Brücke”, jointly run by a British and a German director. In 1955 the Federal Republic of Germany regained full sovereignty. This ended the confiscation of the Caschhaus, which had originally been a department store. The institution was once more renamed into “Internationales Bildungswerk Die Brücke”. Ever since the complete closure has been hanging over the institution like the sword of Damocles. In 1969 the independent institute was taken over as one of many departments of the Volkshochschule. In 1979 the translocation of the Carschhaus by 23 m to make room for an underground station necessitated the move of “Die Brücke” to some cheerless upstairs rooms near the main station. Five years later it moved to the newly built extension of the Wilhelm-Marx-Haus, where it is still located. The name was given to the whole building, while what was left of the venerated original institution was reduced to parts of the fourth floor. Severe cuts in the budget in 1991 made the place so unattractive that the threatened closure became real by the late 1990s. At this point a group of regular visitors -- led by Elizabeth Neill -- took over in an unprecedented private attempt to save “Die Brücke”. On February 1, 1999 the contract was signed. Since then a host of volunteers have been doing a fabulous job and can do with all the support you can give them! -Britta Zangen
