Early years The club was formed in 1892 as
BFC Hertha 92, taking its name from a steamship with a blue and white smokestack; one of the four young men who founded the club had taken a day trip on this ship with his father. The name Hertha is a variation on
Nerthus, referring to a fertility goddess from Germanic mythology. Hertha performed consistently well on the field, including a win in the first Berlin championship final in 1905. Hertha merged with the well-heeled club
Berliner Sport-Club to form
Hertha Berliner Sport-Club.
Postwar play Tensions between the
western Allies and the
Soviets occupying various sectors of the city, and the developing
Cold War, led to chaotic conditions for football in the capital. Hertha was banned from playing against
East German teams in the 1949–50 season after taking on several players and a coach who had fled the
Dresden club
SG Friedrichstadt for
West Berlin. He continued to attend home matches at the stadium, but with the construction of the
Berlin Wall in 1961, this became impossible. Despite this, he did not give up. By this time, Hertha played at the
Stadion am Gesundbrunnen, nicknamed
Die Plumpe. The stadium was located close enough to the Berlin wall for the sounds from the stadium to be heard over the wall. Thus, Klopfleisch and other supporters gathered behind the wall to listen to the home matches. When the crowd at the stadium cheered, Klopfleisch and the others cheered as well. Klopfleisch later came under suspicion from the
Stasi, the East German secret police. He was arrested and interrogated on numerous occasions.
Entry to the Bundesliga At the time of the formation of the
Bundesliga in 1963, Hertha was Berlin's reigning champion, and so became an inaugural member of the new professional national league. In spite of finishing clear of the relegation zone, the team was demoted after the
1964–65 season following attempts to bribe players to play in the city under what had become decidedly unpleasant circumstances after the erection of the Berlin Wall. Hertha, however, was again soon touched by scandal through its involvement with several other clubs in the Bundesliga matchfixing scandal of 1971. In the course of an investigation of Hertha's role, it was also revealed that the club was 6 million
DM in debt. Financial disaster was averted through the sale of the team's former home ground. where it would spend 13 of the next 17 seasons. Plans in 1982 for a merger with
Tennis Borussia Berlin,
SpVgg Blau-Weiß 1890 Berlin and
SCC Berlin to form a side derisively referred to as "FC Utopia" never came to fruition. After the fall of the Berlin Wall, Hertha became a popular side in East Berlin as well. Two days after the wall came down, 11,000 East Berliners attended Hertha's match against
SG Wattenscheid. By 1997, Hertha had returned to the Bundesliga, Despite a late-season slump, Hertha still finished in seventh place for the season, Hertha lost the third round play-off 3–2 on aggregate to
Brøndby, winning the first leg 1–0 in Berlin, but losing the second away tie 3–1, with
Teemu Pukki scoring a hat-trick for the Danish side. In the
2016–17 Bundesliga season, Hertha enjoyed its best ever start to a Bundesliga season in terms of points won during the opening eight matches, losing just one match – away against
Bayern Munich – and forcing a draw away against
Borussia Dortmund. At the 2016–17 Bundesliga winter break, Hertha stood at third place in the league, with nine wins, three draws and four losses.
Lars Windhorst's era In June 2019,
Lars Windhorst bought a €125 million stake in the club. On 27 November 2019,
Jürgen Klinsmann became the new manager of Hertha BSC, replacing
Ante Čović. Klinsmann left the club on 11 February 2020, after only 76 days in charge. Assistant manager
Alexander Nouri took interim charge of the team, before the permanent appointment of
Bruno Labbadia on 9 April 2020. In 2020, Windhorst bought an increased stake in the club, bringing his total investment to almost $500 million. But sporting success did not follow. On 24 January 2021, Labbadia was sacked as Hertha manager, with the club sitting inside the relegation play off places with his replacement being former manager
Pál Dárdai. After nine months in charge and steering the club to safety, Dárdai was terminated as manager and replaced with
Tayfun Korkut. Korkut was terminated after just four months in charge with the club sitting 17th on the table in the relegation zone. Korkut was replaced with
Felix Magath. Magath managed to steer the club to safety as they won the relegation play-off against
Hamburger SV 2–1 on aggregate. After avoiding relegation, Magath was replaced with
Sandro Schwarz as manager. Within months of Schwarz's hiring, however, relations between Hertha and Windhorst had deteriorated to the point where Windhorst no longer wanted anything to do with the club. Schwarz was sacked in April 2023 following a 5–2 loss to
Schalke 04 that left Hertha at the bottom of the table. Pál Dárdai took over the head coaching job for the third time but he could not prevent Hertha's inevitable relegation , and Hertha were relegated after conceding a 93rd minute equaliser at home to VfL Bochum on Matchday 33. ==Stadium==