<P> The events that demolished the Iron Curtain started in discontent in Poland, and continued in Hungary, the German Democratic Republic (East Germany), Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, and Romania . Romania became the only communist state in Europe to overthrow its totalitarian government with violence . </P> <P> The use of the term iron curtain as a metaphor for strict separation goes back at least as far as the early 19th century . It originally referred to fireproof curtains in theaters . Although its popularity as a Cold War symbol is attributed to its use in a speech Winston Churchill gave in March 1946 in Fulton, Missouri, German Minister of Propaganda Joseph Goebbels had already used the term in reference to the Soviet Union . </P> <P> Various usages of the term "iron curtain" (Russian: Железный занавес Zheleznyj zanaves; German: Eiserner Vorhang; Georgian: რკინის ფარდა Rkinis pharda Czech: Železná opona; Slovak: Železná opona; Hungarian: Vasfüggöny; Romanian: Cortina de fier, Italian: Cortina di ferro, Serbian: Гвоздена завеса Gvozdena zavesa, Estonian: Raudne eesriie, Bulgarian: Желязна завеса Zhelyazna zavesä) pre-date Churchill's use of the phrase . The concept goes back to the Babylonian Talmud of the 3rd to 5th centuries CE, where Tractate Sota 38b refers to a "mechitza shel barzel", an iron barrier or divider: "אפילו מחיצה של ברזל אינה מפסקת בין ישראל לאביהם שבשמים" (Even an iron barrier cannot separate (the people of) Israel from their heavenly father). </P> <P> The term "iron curtain" has since been used metaphorically in two rather different senses - firstly to denote the end of an era and secondly to denote a closed geopolitical border . The source of these metaphors can refer to either the safety curtain deployed in theatres (the first one was installed by the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane in 1794) or to roller shutters used to secure commercial premises . </P>

Why was west berlin such a strange city during the cold war