Im Oktober 1944 kam es im Val Formazza nahe der Schweizer Grenze zu einem Kampf zwischen den sich zurückziehenden Partisanen und den deutschen und faschistischen Truppen. Einige Widerstandskämpfer konnten in die Schweiz flüchten.
The Ossola Republic

In autumn 1944, partisan groups liberated a sizeable territory around Domodossola from the Nazis and founded their own republic. But the resistance fighters were at odds with one another and after just over a month the dream of an independent state came to an end. The story of a tragedy on the border with Switzerland.

Fritz Schmied became something of a confidant for Winston Churchill over the years.
Churchill’s Swiss personal chef

Fritz Schmied, a young chef from rural Fribourg, worked as personal chef to political heavyweight Winston Churchill for a number of years.

High heels from Switzerland for the American market: a gleaming selection of Bally shoes from the 1930s.
High heels: from the battlefield to the height of fashion

High heels are a perennially popular fashion accessory. Nowadays, it’s usually women who wear them as the days of men going into battle on horseback with heeled footwear are in the past. The cultural history of the high heel is a mixture of myth, modishness and might.

Latest posts

Plotting Switzerland’s borders: the case of Testa Grigia

Felix Frey 11.09.2025 The construction of an aerial cableway from the Italian town of Breuil to Testa Grigia in 1937 alarmed the federal authorities as the terminus was located in the sensitive Swiss-Italian border area.
One of the border stones placed on Testa Grigia in 1938.

The day a king died in Bern

Peter Haenger 09.09.2025 The first King of Iraq died in Bern aged just 48 in September 1933. Who was Faisal I, and how did his early death impact the Hashemite dynasty?
Newspaper ‘Der Bund’ reports the death of Iraqi King Faisal I in Bern on 9 September 1933.

Europe’s first female professor

Franziska Rogger 04.09.2025 In 1909, Anna Tumarkin became the first woman in Europe to be appointed a university professor in her own right. She taught at the University of Bern for decades and garnered international respect as an academic.
Anna Tumarkin made a name for herself at the dawn of the 20th century in an academic world dominated by men.

Martin Bodmer: building a library of world literature

David Chauvier 02.09.2025 Swiss intellectual and bibliophile Martin Bodmer dedicated his life to preserving written knowledge. His extensive collection is now part of the UNESCO Memory of the World.
Martin Bodmer dedicated his entire life to building up a unique collection of documents.
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Popular posts

What happened to Maria Theresia Wilhelm?

Stefan Keller 24.07.2025 In July 1960, a woman went missing in the St. Gallen Rhine Valley, never to be seen again. She was a psychiatric patient and the mother of seven children who had all been taken into care. The story of Maria Theresia Wilhelm and her husband Ulrich Gantenbein is a tragic tale, marred by violence and the arbitrary actions of public authorities.
Maria Theresia Wilhelm and her future husband Ulrich Gantenbein were the victims of ‘compulsory social measures’.

The Kander river deviation and its aftermath

Reto Bleuer 14.08.2025 The stretch of A6 motorway between Thun and Spiez follows the path of a former riverbed and crosses a pioneering project of Swiss water cor-rection dating from the early 18th century. The Kander river deviation had a big impact on the region around the town of Thun and on the man who initiated and managed the project: Samuel Bodmer.
The deviation of the course of the river Kander fundamentally changed the regional landscape. A map from 1716, subsequently amended.

Sexuality in the Middle Ages

Valérie Lüthi 13.06.2024 If we hazard a look at the medieval era, we discover a history of sexuality that is far more multilayered than we might at first have imagined. While the Christian church sought to extend its influence into private bedchambers, ‘lascivious’ attitudes and practices stood in the way of its ambitions.
Detail from The Garden of Earthly Delights by Hieronymus Bosch, 1490-1500.

Does Switzerland really date back to 1291? A fresh look at the country’s origins

Kurt Messmer 31.07.2023 Young nations need long histories. In 1891, the Federal Council of Switzerland, a 43-year-old state at the time, somewhat arbitrarily decided the country went back 600 years, even assigning its foundation to a specific day, 1 August. Without delving too much into the dogma, the story goes something like this.
Switzerland’s family tree

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