First mentioned in 1598 as Schöne Weyde, it became an industrial town at the end of the 19th century.

In the Nazi era, Oberschöneweide developed into a stronghold of resistance against National Socialism, which despite constant arrests and death sentences could not be broken. The resistance cells were most numerous from 1942-1944. The factories in Oberschoeneweide remained the foundation of the illegal Berlin KPD headquarters.

The mass recalls from 1941 resulted in a lack of staff in the factories. In order to maintain production, more forced laborers from all over Europe were employed. Several barracks camps were built for forced laborers in Wuhlheide. Located here was also the Gestapo subordinate Berlin work education camp of the same name. More than 6,000 foreign forced laborers worked in Kabelwerk Oberspree and other factories located in the AEG factory complex, as well as female inmates at the Sachsenhausen concentration camp from 1944-1945.

In the Allied air raids on 21 June and 6 August 1944, Oberschöneweide endured heavy carpet bombing, while the Kabelwerk Wilhelminenhof was heavily damaged. The attack of 26 February 1945 greeted Oberschöneweide once again in its entirety. Among the casualties were many foreign forced laborers.