The Intercontinental Hotel Bucharest – 1968

Intercontinental Hotel (rear) in Bucharest 1968
Photo © by Dan Dimancescu

Russia invaded Czechoslovakia this year and Ceaucescu was the ‘hero’ in acting belligerent toward the Soviet Union. Relations with America were positive and Pr. Nixon visited Bucharest. There was a sense of some form of normalcy returning after the traumatic first 15-20 years of Communism. The new Intercontinental hi-rise hotel became a symbol of Romania’s new-felt international status – though filled with securitate people. Twenty years later the location in the photo adjacent to University Square would witness some of the worst violence of the December 1989 ‘revolution.’