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An brook so narrow you scarcely got your ankles wet separated a village for more than four decades worth of time. By an accident of topography, the 50 locals of Mödlareuth, a tiny settlement bordered by evergreen groves, pastures and spectacular views, found themselves at the core of the cold war. They had the misfortune to span the Bavarian region, in the Federal Republic of Germany, and Thuringia in the Soviet sector, a border that was marked first by a enclosure and then by a barricade. US troops dubbed it Small Berlin.

Memorialising Historical Events

Months after their own wall was torn down, and even before their country had reunified in 1990, a assembly of local people set about memorialising their past. The project is close to reach completion: on 9 November, the thirty-sixth anniversary of the fall of the German barrier, the Museum of German Division Mödlareuth will inaugurate. It was officially opened by the national president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in early October, but the display wasn’t quite finished. Telling the residents who endured the old days, Steinmeier said: “You were observers of an inhuman division, which pulled households into pieces and turned local residents into strangers.”

“You were observers of an inhuman split, which ripped families asunder and turned neighbours into strangers.”

Historical Background

Right from its establishment in 1810, the community cut across the Kingdom of Bavaria and the Reuss Principality, a noble lineage best known for bestowing all its male descendants the title Heinrich and labeling them sequentially by date of birth. As Steinmeier related to the crowd, the peculiarity was never an obstacle in the path of the inhabitants drinking in the very same inn, going to the same church and sending their young ones to the very same educational institution.

After the War Division

Then came the global conflict. The moment they came, the Russians erected wooden posts by the stream. For a twelve months they occupied the complete hamlet, creating their headquarters in a house on the Bavarian territory side, adorning it with a picture of Stalin and a Soviet emblem. The American soldiers persuaded them to withdraw back over the creek. For a period, residents could continue to cross over, though as limitations tightened they were obliged to display identity papers, although all was aware who they were, and to go back at evening.

Escalation of Border Measures

After that, in 1952, came wire fencing and the formal sealing of the frontier. In 1966, as in Berlin previously in 1961, a concrete structure was constructed, with explosives, vehicle barriers and watchtowers. The residents could continue to observe each other by ascending hills, but on the eastern side waving and calling out were forbidden. A local woman was added to a Stasi watch list for responding “same to you” to a West German local who said her “happy new year”.

Museum Development

I heard accounts including these by Robert Lebegern, the head of the institution, who has devoted a significant portion of his professional career creating it. Villagers were consulted in the initial phases about how much structure they wished to keep. They chose a section on the Bavarian edge, close to where a villager managed to flee in the middle of the night with a ladder, subsequently the border was significantly strengthened.

Preserved Installations

A pair of guard towers are conserved alongside a set of displays illustrating the most significant moments in the village’s history. As we move, Lebergen details the regulations: not a single person could get closer than 5km of the border. Agricultural workers had to obtain specific authorization to care for their fields; the partner could operate the harvesting machine but never both, lest they tried to make a run for it. Military personnel kept guard.

Wider Context

The frontier between the Federal Republic and the GDR stretched 1,400 kilometers, from the northern sea in the north to the south in the southern region. Berlin is commemorated and documented the most, but more than two times more individuals (exceeding 300) lost their lives trying to traverse it in provincial zones than in the urban center. Robert Lebegern tells me that almost all of attempts to flee were unsuccessful.

Community Daily Living

The greater part of Mödlareuth’s villagers were rural laborers or artisans, who adapted to dwelling in the ambiguous area between 2 political systems by staying low-profile and caring for their fields. They neither supported the communist regime nor opposed it, Lebegern explains.

Interest

For sightseers, however, the hamlet became a sort of site of interest. Roughly 15,000 came to see each year, viewing tools in their hands, to gawp – and then quickly depart. In 1983, the United States leader, George Bush, was given a tour by the German defence minister.

Twenty-five years after reunification, the television series, a TV series about a made-up village similar to Mödlareuth, resulted in new interest.

Current Evolutions

The opening of the new museum – with a cafe, boutique, film screening area and large vehicle area – is probable to