I was engaged at the time to a German woman who lived under the nazis and the Communists in East Germany. Her parents and her lived in the same apartment close to Tempelhof Airport. I have been a passenger in airplanes that took off from and landed there. It is closed now. I talked to her parents about life in East Germany. They said the father had been mayor of a East German town and had a lumber business that also sold coal. I asked him about life under Hitler vs life under the Soviets. He said after 1945, he was able to have the lumber and coal business with few problems. But around 17 years after the war ended, the Soviets were taking over businesses and homess. He got scared as you might imagine. And vowed to go to West Berlin along with his wife and daughter. They all took different ways to West Berlin and when he got there, he was able to live off cash he had sent to West Berlin and got a loan which he used to open up a Dry Cleaning business in Berlin. This business made a good living off of cleaning the actors garbs. They cleaned my clothes for me in fact and that where I met the daughter who we got engaged to marry by 1964. Yes Germans in East Germany voted.
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Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org › wiki › 1950_East_German_g...
General
elections were held in
East Germany on 15 October 1950. They were the first held since the founding of the country on 7 October 1949.