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<\/p>\nNew College of Florida announced Tuesday it has received a donation of one of the largest collections of Berlin Wall segments in the world.<\/p>\n
The Berlin Wall stood between East Germany and West Germany during the Cold War. The collection\u2019s surfaces were rarely touched or seen during the war, the college said. The wall segments were donated by philanthropist Jack Jawitz.<\/p>\n
The pieces are 3 feet by 9 feet and comprise the largest collection outside of Germany, spokesperson Jamie Miller said in a text message. The largest public collection in the United States is eight pieces, he said, and the college\u2019s collection is \u201csignificantly more.\u201d<\/p>\n
Every attendee at Tuesday\u2019s news conference would receive a piece of the wall and a certificate of authenticity, Miller said.<\/p>\n
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The announcement came shortly beforePeter Robinson, the author of Ronald Reagan\u2019s famous 1987 speech that called on former Soviet Union president Mikhail Gorbachev to \u201ctear down this wall,\u201d was scheduled to speak on campus Tuesday evening. Robinson is also a fellow at Stanford University\u2019s conservative policy research center, the Hoover Institution.<\/p>\n
New College plans to commemorate the donation through programming, public lectures and \u201ccampus dialogue centered on freedom, the lessons of history and the enduring responsibility to promote and defend free societies,\u201d according to a news release. The college will mark the 39th anniversary of that speech in June, and celebrate the 40th anniversary of the Berlin Wall\u2019s fall in 2029.<\/p>\n
Richard Corcoran, New College\u2019s president, said in a statement that the wall\u2019s segments are witnesses to the \u201chorrors of communism.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cMay the Wall remind us what happens when speech is silenced, dissent is punished, and ideology is enforced by force,\u201d he said. \u201cNew College is honored to steward this history and to ensure it serves as a permanent educational reminder of the triumph of freedom over oppression.\u201d<\/p>\n
In November, the Florida Board of Education adopted new standards teaching the \u201cevils of communism\u201d<\/a> which drew criticism from parents and historians.<\/p>\n New College historian Mitchel Ruzek said in a statement that studying the Cold War examines how close the world came to destruction.<\/p>\n \u201cHaving these original segments of the Berlin Wall on campus transforms history from abstraction into experience,\u201d he said. \u201cStudents will be able to engage directly with the physical reality of ideological division and apply those lessons to today\u2019s global challenges.\u201d<\/p>\n