Queer Heroes - the DIY Audio Tour
Listen to audio clips or read about queer heroes, activists, role models and champions of history.
Do your own Do-It-Yourselve audio tour! Find a QR-Code and see the next location online on the map or follow one of the suggested tours.
Who are queer heroes?
Queer heroes have successfully fought for rights and paved the way, created queer places of safety, stood up for queer people, behaved against the expected social norms, tried new things, were discriminated against by the majority society or even punished for their identity and orientation and sometimes had to endure great suffering, even to the point of death.
But heroes are also allowed to make mistakes. Aspects of their lives in which they sometimes took the wrong path are human.
The spectrum ranges from better-known queer heroes such as Magnus Hirschfeld, Anita Augspurg, Christopher Isherwood and Charlotte von Mahlsdorf to people less well-known to the public, such as Hilde Radusch, Albrecht von Krosigk and Karl Giese.
How do I find the next location / QR code?
The best way to get to the next location is to use the map on this page to see what’s next in the area. When you click on the number, a pop-up appears with a link to the next post.
Sometimes there are signs with a QR code on site, in some places this will still happen, but sometimes this is unfortunately not possible. If there is a QR code on site, it is indicated at the top of the website next to the address. You can always see on the map where the historical site of our queer heroes is located. You yourself are visible as a blue dot.
There are several locations for some people, but the audio contributions are identical.
The Orange Tour - from the Gay Museum through the queer Nollendorf neighborhood
The tour is about 6 kilometers long and takes about 1 hour to complete. Listening to the 14 audio clips at the 13 locations also takes about an hour, so you’ll be out and about in the neighborhood for a total of about 2 to 2.5 hours. You can also continue walking to the next location while listening, which will of course make it faster. There are several nice places to stop for a break at a café along the way.
The Pink Tour – Cycling from Mitte through Tiergarten to the queer Nollendorf neighborhood
The tour is about 18 kilometers long, and the actual cycling time is approximately 1 hour. If you listen to the 20 audio clips at the various locations, this will also take about 2 hours, so you will be out and about in the neighborhoods for a total of around 3 hours. You can also cycle to the next location with your headphones on, which will of course be faster. Along the way, there are some nice places to take a break in the Tiergarten or at a café.
Note on terminology:
Some of the terms used in the texts are used as they were common at the time of the queer heroes, such as the word “transvestite”, which was common as a self-designation for many people. Today we would express this in a much more differentiated way, for example as trans*, crossdresser, draq king, draq queen, gender-nonconforming or non-binary. As far as possible, the terms are chosen that the person (presumably) chose for themselves, but in some cases we do not know how the people described themselves or how they would describe themselves using today’s vocabulary.
In addition, the word “queer” is also used, which did not even exist at the time of most of the queer heroes described. Nevertheless, today it is the most appropriate word to describe all those who do not correspond to the heterosexual cis majority.
A project by Rafael Nasemann affiliated to the Magnus-Hirschfeld-Gesellschaft e.V., Berlin.
Funded by the Hannchen-Mehrzweck-Stiftung – Stiftung für queere Bewegungen
The map on this site was created using the WP Go Maps Plugin https://wpgmaps.com, thanks for the a free licence
© 2025 – Rafael Nasemann, all rights reserved