Country Germany Area 20,731 km² Disestablished 1945 | State Brandenburg Population 1.317 million (1939) Region seat Frankfurt (Oder) | |
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The Frankfurt Region was a government region in the Prussian Province of Brandenburg between 1815 and 1945. Its administrative capital was Frankfurt (Oder). Today its western part is in the State of Brandenburg while the eastern part, following frontier changes agreed by the Soviet Union in 1945, is part of Poland.
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It was created in 1815, when Prussia reorganised its internal administration. It comprised the mostly rural eastern part of Brandenburg, including the New March and Lower Lusatia. From 1871 Prussia itself was part of the newly founded German Empire.
In 1938 the districts of Arnswalde and Friedeberg were disentangled from the Frankfurt Region and merged into the new government region called Frontier of Posen-West Prussia, which was incorporated into the Province of Pomerania. At the same time the districts of Meseritz and Schwerin (Warthe), were transferred out of what had previously been defined as the Province of Posen-West Prussia, now becoming part of the Frankfurt Region.
In aggregate these changes reduced the land area of the Frankfurt Region from 20,731 km² to 18,390 km².
In 1945 the part of the region to the east of the River Oder became part of Poland while the western part fell within the Soviet Zone of occupation in Germany. West of the Oder, the Land of Brandeburg, created in 1946, was not administratively subdivided into "government regions". Three years later, however, the newly evolving East German state undertook further administrative reforms in 1952 and the western areas of the former Frankfurt Region became part of the new Frankfurt Bezirk (district).