10The Barn

1946This is the Springer family’s summer house in the Lüneburg Heath. Here – more precisely, in the sheep barn – Axel Springer and his father Hinrich began planning a new start even before the war had ended. After months of uncertainty, Hinrich Springer received a British license to revive the publishing house Hammerich & Lesser, which had been owned by the family since 1909 and in which Axel became a half-owner in 1945. “Soon,” Axel Springer said, “the free word will apply again in Germany.” From 1946 onward, he used another publishing house for this purpose – one that now bore his own name.