Gisela Maletski and her cat Peter (1955)

 


Four-year-old Gisela Maletski, whose family fled from East Prus. sia to West Berlin, has a playground most of her contemporaries would surely envy. She lives at one side of an abandoned railroad station in West Berlin. Each day Gisela and her cat, Peter, go out to play among rusty, grass-grown tracks and pocked plat. forms. When Photographer Peter Senzer came upon them one day recently, Gisela was teetering delightedly atop a sightless signal light while Peter the cat huddled inside it, enjoying a moment of unruffled peace and quiet.

These pleasant days will, however, soon end for the pair. The city has condemned the family's living quarters and Gisela will be searching for a new, and undoubtedly far duller, playground.

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images and info provided by the LIFE Magazine / LIFE Magazine International / LIFE Magazine Atlantic ARCHIVE from the Zetu Harrys Collection

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