Konrad Zuse Museum in Hoyerswerda | Expelled?

The A 5120 was a computer exclusively for offices for word and data processing. Photo: IMAGO/Hohlfeld On the penultimate opening day of the Konrad Zuse Museum Hoyerswerda, former employees of the GDR computer combine “Robotron” came from Dresden again at the end of August. The agile gentlemen over 60, like thousands of others, arrived shortly before closing to say goodbye to an exhibition on computer history that is unique in Germany. Their technical discussions seemed like an incantation. They had co-produced some of the exhibits seen here in Dresden-Gruna, for example the R40 computer and other components of the ESER computer system in the Eastern Bloc's “Council for Mutual Economic Aid”. But the first desktop PCs like the Robotron 1715 are also here.

Stand or stand? Due to a lack of money, the Zuse Museum had to close at the end of August, and not just to visitors. His impressive collection is also threatened with dissolution. Konrad Zuse (1910–1995) was a brilliant tinkerer and, as an engineering student, came up with the idea of ​​making calculations easier using machines, according to his own admission, “out of laziness”. The Z1 calculating machine still worked more or less mechanically with “calculating sheets”. The Z3 from 1941 is considered to be the first functional computer on earth and switched using electromechanical relays. The museum proudly shows the tube-powered Z22, which can be considered the first fully electronic calculating machine. If you like, this was also the birth of digital technology with the two safe switching states zero and one.

The support association has collected 18,000 devices, and not just Robotron products.

The principles of computer architecture are the same today as they were 80 years ago. Wolfgang Kunde, previously chairman of the support association, leads through parts of the building that the average visitor would otherwise hardly be able to see in the 1,000 square meter exhibition space. A student laboratory for computer science lessons, for example, and a specialist library with 6,000 volumes. But an overwhelming treasure lies in the cellar. The association has collected 18,000 devices, not just Robotron products, but also products from all global brands and pioneering companies such as IBM from several decades.

Konrad Zuse only spent a few years of his youth in Hoyerswerda with his parents. When he died in 1995, the city recognized the opportunity to create a brand with him. From then on it was called Konrad-Zuse-Stadt and posthumously awarded him honorary citizenship. In the same year, the first small Zuse museum was set up, which continued to grow. After a 3.3 million euro renovation and expansion, it reopened at its current location in January 2017 under the direction of the support association.

The alarm bells were already ringing last year when the supervisory board of the city-owned housing company decided to close down the ZCOM computer museum at the end of 2026. What does the Zuse Museum have to do with the housing company, apart from the fact that it uses rooms in the basement of a prefabricated building between Hoyerswerda's old and new town? In 2017, the housing company contributed the modest start-up capital for the new ZCOM foundation and 300,000 euros annually for ongoing operations. But then that same supervisory board said it could no longer be responsible for such cultural expenditure that was unrelated to its mission in times of crisis.

However, it was hardly known publicly that 140,000 euros of this was returned as annual rent. “We have learned from it,” says Mayor Torsten Ruban-Zeh (SPD), saying that he considers this construct to be a mistake. The Neustadt Forum, which is currently being expanded, should also be structured in this way. He prevented this right at the beginning of his term in office in 2020. The mayor takes credit for having won a broad majority in the city council in March 2026 to increase the city's subsidy to 300,000 euros. Together with the 100,000 euros from the cultural area and other funding, the annual requirement of around half a million euros could have been covered.

But then the support association and the difficult new museum director fell out, reports Wolfgang Kunde. The city council then canceled the remaining city subsidy by a narrow majority at the end of June. Hopes for a one-off 250,000 euros from an anonymous donor were not fulfilled in July. Its conditions also included a new museum concept. This already exists, but according to the support association there is not enough money to implement it. ZCOM has long been accused of insufficient visitor numbers and therefore a lack of internal income. But 30,000 visitors a year were a false assumption right from the start. “We are a science museum and an educational location and not an adventure area,” says customer once again clarifying the character of the house.

For years, the support association had tried in vain to be included in the Saxon Industrial Museum special purpose association, which already only had four locations. The current request to the Saxon Ministry of Culture and Tourism for bridging financing of 200,000 euros also came to nothing. In this autumn of failed reforms, the Saxon state parliament is trying to make the draft disaster budget for 2027/28 not quite so catastrophic. Not to mention local finances. This also seemed to finally seal the fate of the Zuse Museum.

But at the beginning of October you suddenly hear something astonishing. Contrary to fears, the dismantling of the exhibition and the depot has not yet begun. Every Wednesday there is a guided tour that you can register for, and on Fridays there is a computer meeting. The unique collection will be spared from the threat of dissolution at least until the end of the year. “We are resisting tooth and nail,” explains Gerhard Walter, the new chairman of the support association, confidently and lists the activities. In any case, the substantive work, most of which was carried out on a voluntary basis, has already been in the hands of the association.

Under no circumstances will they go along with Mayor Ruban-Zeh's plan to limit the memory of Konrad Zuse to a kind of traditional cabinet in the future Neustadtforum. The former youth clubhouse in the Neustadt, which emerged from the ground using brown coal, is currently being expanded into a culture and events center for 13 million euros. There is talk again about accommodating at least the depot in the nearby former Knappenrode briquette factory. It is one of the four locations of the Saxony Industrial Museum Association.

Gerhard Walter and the support association are currently in discussions with many people. They hope to win back the anonymous donor from the summer with his 250,000 euros. At the end of September we at least sat with the mayor. The structure of the ZCOM Foundation should be reformed and the museum educational concept should finally be implemented. The club's busy friends even turned to Bill Gates. Shortly before his death in 1995, the computer pioneer and amateur painter Zuse presented the computer pioneer Gates with a self-painted portrait. “I would work with the devil.” Gerhard Walter is happy with any means to save the Zuse Museum. Hope is not dead yet.

The scandal also points to Saxony's overall strikingly indifferent approach to the technical and cultural heritage of which it is supposedly so proud. The fight to preserve industrial museums after 1990 was no glory. It was only after 30 years that the fourth state exhibition in 2000 was dedicated to industrial culture. Hoyerswerda adorns itself with the subtitle “Konrad-Zuse-Stadt”, but the honorary citizen is not allowed to taste the city anything.

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