HAVE GERMAN WILL TRAVEL This Week in Histor

FAMOUS EVENTS: What happened on ... ?

Was ist am 7. November 1957 geschehen? an diesem Tag in der Geschichte

THE TRABANT, THE ICONIC EAST GERMAN , TURNS 60 Now his company employs eight people and sells 1,500 articles ranging from small screws to the vehicle's complete . Interest in the iconic car goes beyond German borders, Hofmann adds.

Hofmann has sent Trabant parts to countries such as the UK, Belgium, Hungary, Russia, Australia and the US. He has even sent a brake cylinder to Namibia.

'The Trabi is not just an east German product," said Wolfgang Kie[\ling, chairman of the International Trabant Register, an association which holds all trademark rights to the cult automobile.

Kie[\ling thinks an increasing interest in the iconic vehicle - especially among younger people - doesn't only have to do with its nostalgia factor.

Hofmann agrees. "The Trabant is the opposite of our modern technical world,' he said.

Back in the mid 1950s, this is exactly what council ministers in east wanted: a small, robust, economical and inexpensive car. The Trabant then quickly became the most common vehicle in .

Nowadays thousands of Germans and non-Germans alike are still driving an east German "travelling cardbox box."

Meanwhile those who don't own a Trabi can at least get up close and personal with one.

The history of the cult car will soon be told in the same place it began to rattle off production lines 60 years ago; at the August Museum in , a new permanent exhibition dedicated to the Trabi opens on November 10th.

The museum has recently undergone an expansion and three quarters of the new space will in future belong to the Trabant alone, said museum spokeswoman Annett Kannhiiuser.

The "running cardboard," the "plastic bomber" or the "Saxon " - those are just some of the many nicknames that have been given to the Trabant.

And there's a grain of truth to every joke: The car, which was produced in Zwickau, Saxony, was made of a bard plastic known as Dw-oplast, made from rc<..-ycled materials including pressed cotton fibers, synthetic resins and rngs from the Soviet Union.

Metal was in short supply in the GDR, so the Trahi's carmaker used the raw materials that were available at thal Lime-at least the car couldn't m st completely.. ,

Innovation? No, thanks!

Although there were plan5 for further development - and East German engineers even came up with prototypes - GDR leaders nalted the production of new, enhanced models . Inevitably, the East Gennan car industry could not keep up with the West, so the Trabi was condemned Lo remain the dirty, noisy exhaust blower we've !mown to this day.

Since there was hardly any alternative to the Trabi in the GDR, it found buyers. People were even eager to wait years for it, since the demand far exceeded the supply. While around 16-4 million people l ived in East Germany in 1989, only about three million Trabis were made from 1959 to 1991.