Frankfurt History App

The Frankfurt History App opens up new approaches to the historical traces of the city: It connects places with personal stories, historical recordings, video clips and audio tours. Today's city is the starting point from which users can actively navigate through history with the app. It offers historical knowledge for on-the-go: for quick exploration of the immediate surroundings or for longer city tours. This knowledge is constantly being expanded in a participatory manner, new topics and locations can be added by users, and tours can also be put together by users themselves. At the moment the app presents two main topics: Frankfurt and the National Socialism and Revolution 1848/49. The app is maintained by the Historisches Museum Frankfurt (Historical Museum Frankfurt) and offers an open and sustainable mediation platform for initiatives, associations, museums and archives.

Over 1,000 places relating to the National Socialist past have been compiled by the Historisches Museum Frankfurt (Historical Museum Frankfurt) together with the Institut für Stadtgeschichte (Institute for the History of Frankfurt) and community initiatives. These places are all located on a city map. Even at first glance, you can see how much National Socialism has inscribed itself in the city's history. The map distinguishes between places of persecution, places of resistance and "Volksgemeinschaft". Stolpersteine and monuments are also visible in the app. The content shows different perspectives of those affected: Jews, Roma and Sinti, forced laborers, people with disabilities, queer people. They tell stories of political and religious resistance or of nonconforming behavior, as in the case of the swing youth.

In 1848/49 courageous citizens and visionary parliamentarians fought for and won the foundation of our present constitution and democracy. Frankfurt was one of the centers of revolution in Germany during these years. Now, the Institute for the History of Frankfurt added three revolutionary tours to the Frankfurt History App. They lead to the theaters of the revolution, the meeting places of the political groups and the scenes of the September riots.

In addition, tours were also produced that open up inclusive and innovative approaches to the topic. We developed a tour in Leichte Sprache (plain language) for the burial ground of the "euthanasia" victims at Frankfurt's main cemetery in cooperation with Lebenshilfe Frankfurt. The Frankfurt artist Katharina Müller has designed a graphic approach and exploration of memorial sites. With tours, biographies and in-depth content in German and English, the app is a flexible educational offer for very different target groups such as school classes and tourists.