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A brook so low you scarcely got your feet wet separated a settlement for over four decades worth of time. By an accident of geography, the half a hundred residents of Mödlareuth, a tiny settlement encircled by evergreen groves, fields and spectacular scenery, found themselves at the center of the cold war. They had the bad luck to cross the Bavarian region, in Western Germany, and the Thuringian region in the East, a border that was marked first by a enclosure and then by a partition. American soldiers dubbed it Little Berlin.

Memorialising Historical Events

Several months after their own wall was opened, and even before their nation had reunified in 1990, a group of local people began commemorating their history. The effort is close to come to fruition: on 9 November, the thirty-sixth commemoration of the fall of the Berlin Wall, the Museum of German Division Mödlareuth will open. It was publicly launched by the federal president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in the first part of October, but the display was not entirely ready. Addressing the villagers who lived through the former times, Steinmeier stated: “You were bystanders of an inhuman split, which tore relatives into pieces and turned neighbours into aliens.”

“You were bystanders of an brutal split, which pulled households into pieces and turned neighbours into foreigners.”

Bygone Background

Right from its creation in 1810, the hamlet spanned the Kingdom of Bavaria and the Principality of Reuss, a princely house most renowned for bestowing all its male members the designation Heinrich and counting them sequentially by birth. As Steinmeier told the gathering, the oddity was never an obstacle in the way of the locals gathering in the same inn, going to the same church and placing their kids to the very same educational institution.

Post-War Separation

Next arrived the second world war. Immediately after they arrived, the Russian troops put up timber poles by the brook. For a year they took over the complete community, setting up their headquarters in a house on the Bavarian side, decorating it with a picture of Stalin and a red star. The American soldiers urged them to pull back back over the stream. For a time, locals could still cross over, though as controls became stricter they were forced to display identification, although all was aware who they were, and to go back at after dark.

Escalation of Frontier Restrictions

Subsequently, in 1952, came barbed wire and the formal sealing of the frontier. In 1966, as in Berlin half a decade before, a barrier was erected, with landmines, anti-tank obstacles and observation points. The villagers could continue to observe each other by climbing elevations, but on the Soviet side signaling and calling out were banned. One woman was placed on a East German secret police watch list for replying “back at you” to a West German villager who greeted her “good new year”.

Heritage Site Development

It was related to me stories such as these incidents by Robert Lebegern, the museum’s director, who has dedicated much of his occupational time building it. Villagers were consulted early on about how what length of barrier they wished to maintain. They selected a portion on the Bavarian fringe, adjacent to where a villager succeeded to flee in the darkest hours with a climbing device, following which the border was heavily fortified.

Maintained Structures

2 guard towers are conserved alongside a set of exhibits illustrating the most dramatic dates in the hamlet’s past. As we walk, Robert Lebegern lists the restrictions: no one could approach 5km of the boundary. Farmers had to obtain special permission to look after their crops; the partner could work the harvesting machine but not both, for fear that they attempted to escape. Soldiers kept guard.

Broader Context

The frontier between the Federal Republic and the GDR extended 1,400 kilometers, from the Baltic Sea in the north to this location in the southern region. Berlin is remembered and memorialised the most frequently, but over twice as many persons (well over 300) lost their lives seeking to traverse it in rural areas than in the urban center. Lebegern informs me that 95% of escape attempts failed.

Hamlet Life

The majority of Mödlareuth’s locals were agricultural workers or artisans, who adapted to dwelling in the grey zone between a pair of ideological spheres by staying low-profile and looking after their land. They nor did they supported the socialist government nor opposed it, Lebegern clarifies.

Tourism

For visitors, however, the hamlet became a sort of site of interest. Roughly 15k came to see each year, optical devices in their hands, to look – and then swiftly go away. In 1983, the American president, George Bush, was guided by the national security head.

Twenty-five years after merger, Tannbach, a broadcast production about a fictional village similar to Mödlareuth, resulted in new curiosity.

Current Developments

The opening of the new museum – with a coffee shop, boutique, film screening area and sizable vehicle area – is likely to