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How I Went into East Germany in 1988 (Before the Wall Came Down) to Film Dog Events

By Ed Frawley

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Back in the 1980s, I started going to West Germany to shoot video of dog competitions and training videos. That's when I started to hear rumors about East German (DDR'S) Dog's. People were talking about how good their border patrol dogs were, how the DDR had their own GSD bloodlines, how their style of Schutzhund was so different. No one I found had ever been behind the old proverbial Iron Curtain and seen these dogs. So I decided to try and go see for myself.

I did a little research and found out when the DDR national German Shepherd championships took place. I wrote the DDR Embassy here in the states and bullshitted them about how I had heard such good things about their dogs and I wanted to come and video these dog shows. I was kind of surprised when they sent me a visa and a letter telling me if I paid 1,000.00 DM (West German Marks) I could come, but I first had to go to the East German Media headquarters in East Berlin.

I knew the Germans are sticklers for organization. A friend of mine has a saying “everything in Germany is either mandatory or forbidden”, and sometimes I think that's still true. I decided I needed better credentials than I had (which was NONE).

So I went to see a friend (Rocky Flynt) who owned the newspaper here in town. I told Rocky that I needed something official that I could show at “Check-Point Charlie”, the East German border crossing. Rocky was a cool dude, he laughed and said he would help make me a Wisconsin Sports TV Press Expert. He asked for an old Wisconsin driver's license, which he proceeded to cut up. He came up with a book that had the Wisconsin state seal which he cut out, and he took a new passport photo of me. He put them all together and took a photo which he then laminated. I had my new official Sports I.D. that I still have it today.

Crossing into East Berlin at “Check-point Charlie” was an experience. There were just a few cars going through every time I crossed, but there was an army of DDR border guards going through every car. They were using dogs to search, guys with mirrors looking under the car, and none looking very friendly. With my big video camera, it took them awhile to check things out and make a phone call someplace before I was let in.

One of the rules to the visa was that I had to stay in a specific hotel, $95.00 a night. The country was so poor I could have spent $5.00 in a local guest house. My room was modern and nice, with a huge mirror on the wall. After checking, I had to walk over the the media headquarters where they assigned two men to my stay. One was a German Shepherd Dog breeder, and the other was a guide (AKA communist guard). Both spoke good English and were nice guys. I was told I couldn't go anywhere without them.

One thing that became very obvious was the stores in the city center were basically empty. I mean they did not have anything in the windows, it was amazing. Plus once you got out of the city center, the city looked like it would have looked back in the 1940s. The buildings needed paint, everything was dingy. The cars all looked like shitty old tin cans, the people looked whipped, eyes down not wanting to make contact. It was a little shocking. My thought back then was that our government has us conned about how dangerous East Germany and the Russians were. Hell, if they could't afford pain and a little maintenance on their buildings, they were not much of a threat.

So the first night there, the two guys asked if I wanted to go out for a beer to a couple of local bars. Hell yes I did. I wore my white Tommy Hillfinger sweater that had a big American flag on the chest (like from one side of the sweater to the other). When we walked into a bar and people started to notice my sweater, it would get a little quiet. I could have been butt ass naked and would have had less people looking at me. But I have to say I was treated nicely if not, like a curiosity.

The dog events were 2-day affairs. They were interesting and different. The dogs were not better than West German Dogs, not by a long shot. Many of them did look better, but they were not better working dogs. I did like the size of their heard, BIG HEADED MALES with nice rich pigment. I am posting the videos I shot in East Berlin in the Leerburg Classics section of our streaming videos. You can go watch them for free.

One of the more interesting moments took place at tracking on Saturday morning. We had to drive out into the country to the tracking fields, which turned out to be right next to an military air force base. So I am setting up my camera equipment and some Migs start to take off right over the trees next to the field. My tour guide came rushing over and told me whatever I did, do not point my camera at those planes. Now these planes looked old and beat up and they all needed paint (like their houses). I kind of miffed him when I made a joke and told him I was way more interested in their German Shepherd Dogs than some beat up old jets.

The rest of the trip was kind of uneventful. I met a lot of GSD breeders and they were all very friendly. I got good video and was happy that I kind of de-bunked the rumors of DDR dogs beings such great working dogs. They were not.

On Sunday afternoon, my two handlers got me back to the hotel at around 5 PM. I invited them to the bar for a few beers on me. When we sat down, a couple came and sat at the table next to us. They both opened books and never turned a page for hours. The more we drank, the more I started to trash talk communism. I questioned them on how they could put up with all this crap, etc. Me and 5 or 6 beers and my big mouth. The two handlers never argued with me, they just listened and finally went home around 10 PM.

So I go to my room, order room service and at 11:30 wake up and think I am on my death bed. I was so sick I could not walk to the bathroom so I crawled. I was sure they had poisoned me over my big mouth. I remember as I crawled past the huge mirror on the wall, I gave it the big FINGER salute. I was sure it was a one way mirror. I actually slept on the bathroom floor until 5 AM. I got up feeling a little better, checked out, drive through check-point charlie, and went to a guest house 10 miles out of town and slept for 2 DAYS.

The funny thing is about 2 months later, I had a similar stomach attack. I went to my doctor and had emergency surgery to remove my appendix. Guess it wasn't poison after all.

The next year I did the same thing. This time I went to Lipsig to the DDR German Shepherd national confirmation show. I met the same two handlers. Both were glad to see me, even my communist buddy. I promised not to bad mouth their politics, they kind of chuckled and said things were changing.

The show was good and I got good video. But Sunday night was the first night the Germans held protest marches in Lipsig and they were right outside my hotel, over 7,000 of them. I kept telling myself that if I could go out there and get video of those damn demonstrations, I could sell them for a ton when I got home. Common sense prevailed, I was pretty sure they would snatch me up, take my $5,000.00 camera (which I could not afford to loose back then) and all my new dog videos. Looking back, I should have tried.

Within a few weeks after I came back, the Wall Came Down and I never heard from my handlers again. Kind of sad. I hope they are doing well, both were young and had families.

We had a fire at our place in 2011. I thought I lost all of my old video footage. I was wrong, I recently found hundred of hours of old VHS and S-VHS tapes. I am encoding them and uploading them to the Leerburg Classic's segment of Leerburg. I have the first DDR tapes which we just encoded and uploaded. I am not through all that I found. I hope I have the second years videos. I'll stream them too if I find them.

If you're not familiar with Leerburg Classics, check them out. We are adding video footage that I have collected over the past 45 years. I lost a lot in our 2011 fire but I also found a ton that I forgot I had stored in another building. I decided to share what I have with Leerburg customers and fans. Maybe young dog trainers will watch some of these old seminars and get hooked like I did a million years ago. I hope so anyway.

View the raw footage that I filmed in 1988 for the DDR working dog championships.

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About Author

Ed Frawley

Ed Frawley is the founder of Leerburg. He has been training dogs since the 1950s. For 30 years, Ed bred working bloodline German Shepherds and has produced over 350 litters. During this time, Ed began recording dog training videos and soon grew an interest in police service dogs. His narcotic dogs have been involved in over 1,000 narcotics searches resulting in hundreds of arrests in the state of Wisconsin. Ed now solely focuses on producing dog training courses with renowned dog trainers nationwide. If you want to learn more about Ed, read about his history here.