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A brook so low you hardly got your feet wet split a village for more than four decades. Due to a quirk of geography, the 50 inhabitants of Mödlareuth, a small village surrounded by coniferous woods, pastures and spectacular views, found themselves at the core of the cold war. They had the bad luck to cross Bavaria, in Western Germany, and Thuringia in the Eastern part, a frontier that was established first by a barrier and then by a partition. United States military personnel nicknamed it Mini Berlin.

Preserving History

Months after their own barrier was breached, and even before their nation had unified again in 1990, a group of local people began documenting their history. The work is soon to be completed: on 9 November, the 36th remembrance of the demolition of the German barrier, the German-German Museum Mödlareuth will begin operations. It was publicly opened by the national president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in early October, but the display was not completely finished. Speaking to the residents who lived through the old days, Steinmeier stated: “You were observers of an cruel division, which tore relatives asunder and turned neighbors into strangers.”

“You were observers of an inhuman separation, which tore households apart and turned neighbours into foreigners.”

Past Background

Right from its establishment in 1810, the hamlet cut across the Bavarian Kingdom and the Reuss Principality, a noble lineage most famous for assigning all its men the title Heinrich and counting them consecutively by birth. As Steinmeier informed the crowd, the quirk never stood in the manner of the inhabitants gathering in the very same pub, attending the identical place of worship and enrolling their young ones to the identical educational institution.

Following WWII Division

Subsequently occurred the World War II. Immediately after they came, the Soviet forces put up wood stakes by the stream. For a twelve months they seized the whole hamlet, setting up their control center in a dwelling on the Bavarian side, adorning it with a picture of Stalin and a red star. The US forces convinced them to pull back to the other side of the brook. For a period, villagers could still jump across, though as controls became stricter they were forced to present identity papers, even though everyone knew who they were, and to go back at after dark.

Increase of Border Restrictions

Then, in 1952, came barbed wire and the legal sealing of the boundary. In 1966, as in Berlin previously in 1961, a concrete structure was built, with explosives, anti-tank obstacles and guard posts. The residents could continue to observe each other by scaling hills, but on the Soviet side gesturing and calling out were banned. One woman was added to a East German secret police surveillance list for responding “likewise” to a western local who wished her “prosperous new year”.

Museum Development

I was told narratives like these by Robert Lebegern, the head of the institution, who has dedicated much of his working life creating it. Locals were polled in the initial phases about how how long a section structure they desired to keep. They chose a portion on the Bavarian edge, near where one of their own succeeded to get away in the middle of the night with a climbing device, subsequently the boundary was heavily fortified.

Preserved Structures

2 watchtowers are conserved in addition to a series of tableaux illustrating the most impactful dates in the community’s past. As we move, Lebergen enumerates the restrictions: not a single person could approach 5km of the border. Rural residents needed particular approval to care for their fields; the spouse could operate the agricultural equipment but not the two, in case they attempted to escape. Armed guards stood watch.

Wider Perspective

The boundary between West Germany and the German Democratic Republic stretched 1,400km, from the Baltic coast in the north to the south in the southern region. Berlin is remembered and honored the greatest, but in excess of twice as many individuals (exceeding 300) died trying to cross it in rural areas than in the metropolis. the director informs me that almost all of efforts to cross did not succeed.

Hamlet Existence

The greater part of Mödlareuth’s locals were rural laborers or skilled workers, who accommodated to living in the ambiguous area between a pair of ideological spheres by keeping their heads down and tending to their farms. They nor did they backed the socialist government nor opposed it, the director states.

Interest

For sightseers, however, the settlement became a kind of destination. About 15k came to visit each year, optical devices in their hands, to gawp – and then quickly go away. In 1983, the American president, George Bush, was given a tour by the German defence minister.

Twenty-five years after unification, Tannbach, a television program about a fictional hamlet similar to Mödlareuth, resulted in renewed curiosity.

Current Changes

The launch of the new museum – with a restaurant, store, movie theater and large car park – is likely to