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An brook so low you barely got your ankles wet divided a community for more than four decades of time. Because of a chance of topography, the half a hundred locals of Mödlareuth, a tiny settlement surrounded by evergreen groves, meadows and spectacular scenery, found themselves at the center of the Cold War tensions. They had the misfortune to cross the Bavarian region, in the Federal Republic of Germany, and the Thuringian region in the East, a frontier that was marked first by a enclosure and then by a partition. United States military personnel dubbed it Little Berlin.

Memorialising Historical Events

Several months after their own wall was opened, and before their nation had unified again in 1990, a assembly of villagers began commemorating their heritage. The effort is soon to reach completion: on 9 November, the 36th anniversary of the fall of the Wall in Berlin, the Museum of German Division Mödlareuth will inaugurate. It was formally launched by the head of state, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in early October, but the exhibition was not completely prepared. Telling the locals who experienced the old days, Steinmeier said: “You were bystanders of an cruel separation, which tore relatives asunder and turned neighbours into strangers.”

“You were bystanders of an brutal separation, which pulled families apart and turned neighbours into strangers.”

Bygone Origins

Even at its establishment in 1810, the hamlet straddled the Bavarian Kingdom and the Reuss Principality, a noble lineage most famous for giving all its male descendants the name Heinrich and numbering them sequentially by birth. As Steinmeier related to the gathering, the peculiarity did not stand in the way of the inhabitants drinking in the very same pub, visiting the same place of worship and enrolling their kids to the same school.

Following WWII Division

Subsequently occurred the second world war. The moment they came, the Russian troops erected wooden posts by the creek. For a year they seized the complete community, creating their control center in a building on the Bavarian side, decorating it with a portrait of Stalin and a communist symbol. The Americans convinced them to retreat across the creek. For a time, locals could continue to cross over, though as controls tightened they were required to display identification, even though all understood who they were, and to come back at evening.

Intensification of Frontier Measures

Subsequently, in 1952, came metal barriers and the official closing of the frontier. In 1966, as in Berlin previously in 1961, a wall was constructed, with mines, vehicle barriers and guard posts. The residents could continue to see each other by climbing elevations, but on the eastern side signaling and calling out were banned. One woman was added to a East German secret police watch list for responding “same to you” to a West German villager who greeted her “happy new year”.

Museum Creation

I heard accounts such as these tales by Robert Lebegern, the head of the institution, who has spent a significant portion of his working life building it. Locals were polled at an early stage about how much structure they wanted to maintain. They selected a portion on the Bavarian edge, near where a local resident was able to get away in the darkest hours with a ladder, following which the border was heavily fortified.

Maintained Structures

Two watchtowers are maintained alongside a collection of exhibits illustrating the most significant dates in the community’s chronicle. As we walk, the director enumerates the restrictions: no one could approach 5km of the frontier. Rural residents had to obtain particular approval to look after their produce; the partner could work the harvesting machine but under no circumstances the two, lest they sought to escape. Military personnel were on duty.

Wider Perspective

The border between West Germany and the GDR stretched 1,400 kilometers, from the northern sea in the northern part to this location in the south. Berlin is remembered and memorialised the most frequently, but in excess of two times more individuals (exceeding 300) died trying to pass over it in provincial zones than in the urban center. the director reminds me that 95% of escape attempts failed.

Village Daily Living

Most of Mödlareuth’s villagers were farmers or craftsmen, who adapted to residing in the grey zone between a pair of political systems by avoiding attention and looking after their farms. They did not endorsed the socialist government nor fought it, Robert Lebegern states.

Tourism

For sightseers, however, the village became a sort of pilgrimage. Roughly fifteen thousand came to see every year, binoculars in hand, to look – and then rapidly go away. In 1983, the American president, George Bush, was shown around by the German defense official.

25 years after reunification, the TV show, a TV series about a imaginary hamlet resembling Mödlareuth, caused renewed interest.

Current Developments

The inauguration of the modern exhibition center – with a coffee shop, shop, cinema room and big car park – is expected to