Berlin Observatory
The Berlin Observatory (Berliner Sternwarte) is a German astronomical institution with a series of observatories and related organizations in and around the city of Berlin in Germany, starting from the 18th century. It has its origins in 1700 when Gottfried Leibniz initiated the "Brandenburg Society of Science″ ("Sozietät der Wissenschaften") which would later (1744) become the Prussian Academy of Sciences ("Preußische Akademie der Wissenschaften"). The Society had no observatory but nevertheless an astronomer, Gottfried Kirch, who observed from a private observatory in Berlin. A first small observatory was furnished in 1711, financing itself by calendrical computations.
Berlin Observatory
In 1913, the Berlin Observatory moved again after 78 years in its second home to Babelsberg (since then it is often referred to as Babelsberg Observatory). The Observatory in Kreuzberg was cleared out and torn down in August 1913. The sale of the land covered the cost of the construction of the new building (1.1 million Goldmarks and the purchase of new instruments to the sum of 450.000 Goldmarks). The land itself on the Babelsberg in the Schlosspark cost the Royal establishment nothing. The hill giving the area its name is situated about three kilometers north-east of the Telegrafenberg.