2009-09-05

Wild west comes to Zweibrücken

Zweibrücken is big on horses. It is home to the state stud farm of Rheinland-Pfalz. On the day I visited, a tribe of country and western fans had set up their tipis there. So much Americana was not a great surprise. The town was a major garrison town for the US army, which at one point had 9,000 American citizens living alongside 38,000 natives and took up 30% of the surface area. When the US army decamped in 1990, the town had to work hard to make good the vast economic vacuum it left in its wake.