It was the only border crossing between East and West Berlin that permitted foreigners passage. Residents of East and West Berlin were not allowed to use it. This contributed to Checkpoint Charlie's mythological status as a meeting place for spies and other shady individuals. Checkpoint Charlie gained its name from the phonetic alphabet; checkpoints "Alpha" and "Bravo" were at the autobahn checkpoints Helmstedt and Dreilinden respectively. Checkpoint Charlie's atmosphere was not improved at all on 27 Oct 1961 when the two Cold War superpowers chose to face each other down for a day. Soviet and American tanks stood approximately 200 m apart, making an already tense situation worse. Now the remains of the Berlin Wall have been moved to permit building, including construction of the American Business Center and other institutions.At the intersection of Zimmerstraße and Friedrichstraße (U-Bahn Kochstraße U6) is the famous "You Are Leaving the American Sector" sign. The actual guardhouse from Checkpoint Charlie is now housed at the Allied Museum on Clayallee. For a more interesting exhibit go to the Haus am Checkpoint Charlie. This is a private museum with kitschy memorabilia from the Wall and the devices GDR residents used to escape the East (including a tiny submarine!). There are also people who set up booths here offering to stamp your passport with souvenir stamps in exchange for a small fee. You are highly advised not to put these stamps in your passport, as these are not official stamps and could invalidate it. Instead, bring along an expired passport or a small booklet to put the stamps in.

Checkpoint Charlie was the Western Bloc's name for the best-known Berlin Wall crossing point between East Berlin and West Berlin during the Cold War (1947–1991), becoming a symbol of the Cold War, representing the separation of East and West. East German leader Walter Ulbricht agitated and maneuvered to get the Soviet Union's permission to construct the Berlin Wall in 1961 to prevent brain drain, emigration and defection from East Berlin and the wider German Democratic Republic into West Berlin. Soviet and American tanks briefly faced each other at the location during the Berlin Crisis of 1961. On 26 June 1963, U.S. President John F. Kennedy visited Checkpoint Charlie and looked from a platform onto the Berlin Wall and into East Berlin, the same day he gave his famous Ich bin ein Berliner speech. After the dissolution of the Eastern Bloc and the reunification of Germany, the American guard house at Checkpoint Charlie became a tourist attraction. It is now located in the Allied Museum in the Dahlem neighborhood of Berlin.