One Of The Earliest Federal Germany Passports by Tom Topol

Update: I found even an earlier document – issued at the German Embassy in New York in Nov 1950! This is now by my best knowledge the earliest Federal Germany passport, and I am proud to have it in my collection!

Allied Military Government For Germany

I acquired one of the earliest Federal Germany passport – issued on 15 February 1951, just 14 days after the Allied Military Government for Germany gave back the power to Germany to issue passports. The printing date of the passport document at the back of the cover indicates 12/50 which means printed December 1950. So far indeed the earliest passport by the young Federal Republic of Germany. The document is in excellent condition and issued in the city of Moers for engineer Dr. Wolfgang Röhrs. Initially, his passport was valid for European countries (including Saarland) only but then extended to “domestic and foreign countries.” His passport includes three visas for Switzerland. His last travel was in May 1955, and the document expired on 14 Feb 1956. Earliest Passport Federal Germany

“The German Federal Republic”

(Deutsche Bundesrepublik, DBR) was one of the terms used in September 1949 by the communist German Democratic Republic to refer to the Federal Republic of Germany (inverting the word order of the official name Bundesrepublik Deutschland). After 1968, the GDR tended to use the initialism “BRD” instead.

The history of Germany since 1990 spans the period following the Reunification of Germany when West Germany and East Germany were reunited after being divided during the Cold War. Germany after 1990 is referred to by historians as the Berlin Republic (Berliner Republik).

This time period is also determined by the ongoing process of the “inner reunification” of the formerly divided country. On October 3, 1990, the German Democratic Republic was dissolved, five states were recreated (Brandenburg, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt, and Thuringia) and the new states became part of the Federal Republic of Germany, an event known as the German Reunification.

Tom Topol | Passport History Expert & Author.
Featured in media incl. CNN, BBC, Newsweek. Awarded by the U.S. Department of State.
"Want to go deeper? My book Let Pass or Die covers the full 400-year history"

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