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An brook so low you barely got your feet wet split a village for more than four decades of time. Due to a quirk of geography, the half a hundred inhabitants of Mödlareuth, a hamlet surrounded by evergreen groves, fields and spectacular vistas, found themselves at the center of the Cold War conflict. They had the misfortune to cross Bavaria, in Western Germany, and Thuringia in the Soviet sector, a frontier that was established first by a enclosure and then by a partition. American soldiers dubbed it Small Berlin.

Preserving History

Months after their own wall was breached, and before their state had reunified in 1990, a assembly of villagers began memorialising their heritage. The work is soon to reach completion: on 9 November, the 36th annual anniversary of the fall of the Wall in Berlin, the German-German Museum Mödlareuth will inaugurate. It was publicly launched by the federal president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in early October, but the display wasn’t quite finished. Speaking to the villagers who experienced the former times, Steinmeier stated: “You were bystanders of an brutal split, which tore relatives apart and turned local residents into aliens.”

“You were witnesses of an inhuman separation, which tore relatives asunder and turned neighbours into foreigners.”

Past Background

Right from its founding in 1810, the village spanned the Royal Bavaria and the Princely State of Reuss, a royal family most famous for assigning all its male descendants the designation Heinrich and labeling them in order by date of birth. As Steinmeier related to the gathering, the quirk did not stand in the path of the locals gathering in the identical pub, visiting the same place of worship and sending their young ones to the very same educational institution.

After the War Division

Next arrived the second world war. Immediately after they arrived, the Russians put up timber poles by the stream. For a annual period they occupied the complete community, setting up their control center in a house on the western side, adorning it with a picture of Stalin and a red star. The Americans persuaded them to pull back to the other side of the brook. For a period, locals could still cross over, though as limitations increased they were obliged to show identification, despite the fact that everyone knew who they were, and to return at evening.

Increase of Frontier Measures

Then, in 1952, came metal barriers and the formal shutting of the boundary. In 1966, as in Berlin half a decade before, a concrete structure was built, with landmines, anti-tank obstacles and guard posts. The residents could continue to view each other by scaling hills, but on the Soviet side waving and shouting were forbidden. A female resident was placed on a Stasi watch list for answering “likewise” to a western local who wished her “good new year”.

Exhibition Center Development

I was told stories including these by Robert Lebegern, the head of the institution, who has dedicated a large part of his working life creating it. Villagers were consulted at an early stage about how how long a section structure they wished to keep. They opted for a section on the west edge, near where one of their own succeeded to escape in the dead of night with a scaling tool, following which the frontier was substantially strengthened.

Maintained Structures

Two observation towers are preserved together with a set of tableaux depicting the most dramatic dates in the hamlet’s chronicle. As we move, Lebergen enumerates the regulations: no one could get closer than 5km of the border. Agricultural workers required special permission to look after their produce; the husband or wife could work the harvesting machine but not both, lest they attempted to make a run for it. Military personnel stood watch.

Wider Perspective

The boundary between West Germany and the German Democratic Republic extended nearly 900 miles, from the Baltic coast in the north to here in the south. Berlin is remembered and memorialised the most, but in excess of two times more individuals (exceeding 300) were killed trying to cross it in countryside regions than in the metropolis. the director tells me that 95% of escape attempts were unsuccessful.

Hamlet Daily Living

The greater part of Mödlareuth’s residents were agricultural workers or craftsmen, who adapted to dwelling in the ambiguous area between two belief systems by staying low-profile and tending to their fields. They nor did they backed the East German authorities nor resisted it, the director clarifies.

Visitors

For tourists, however, the hamlet became a type of pilgrimage. Approximately 15k visited annually, viewing tools in hand, to gawp – and then rapidly leave. In 1983, the United States leader, George Bush, was given a tour by the German defence minister.

Twenty-five years after unification, Tannbach, a broadcast production about a imaginary community resembling Mödlareuth, resulted in fresh interest.

Current Changes

The opening of the recently established museum – with a restaurant, store, film screening area and sizable vehicle area – is likely to