The monument was formally dedicated on 3 August 1951 after temporary placement at a location on a newly designed and impressive boulevard, Stalinallee, being constructed at the time in what was then the Berlin district of Friedrichshain.

Stalin monuments were generally removed from public view by the leadership of the Soviet Union and other associated countries, including East Germany, during the period of De-Stalinization.

Stalinallee, formerly the Große Frankfurter Straße, had been badly damaged in World War II and was renamed on Stalin's birthday, 21 December 1949, in honor of the Soviet head of state.

The newly designed street was a political statement in a post-war reconstruction effort starting in 1951 and comprised an imposing tree-lined boulevard with shops, entertainment venues, gastronomy, and especially monumental new apartment blocks.

The 4.80 meter high bronze statue showed the Soviet head of party and state in a typical military pose with a uniform and medals, in his left hand a scroll.

The temporary location between Andreasstrasse and Koppenstrasse was across the street from a sports hall built in 1951 for the World Festival of Youth and Students (the building was demolished in 1972).

[5] Stalin's personality cult, dictatorship and crimes were denounced in a secret speech by Nikita Khrushchev at the 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in 1956.

Several members of a Stalinallee construction team under brigade leader Gerhard Wolf had the job of reducing the statue to small pieces under guard by security forces.

[8] On 14 November 1961 the city authorities (Magistrat von Berlin) supplied the daily newspapers with the following announcement about what happened:[9] Having taken note of the material from the 22nd Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, the Greater-Berlin city authorities agreed at its meeting of 13 November 1961 on the following measures in connection with the infringement of revolutionary legitimacy which occurred in the period of Stalin's personality cult: The location of the Stalin monument was later disguised by replacing the surrounding pavement slabs and installing a fountain.