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A stream so shallow you barely got your ankles wet split a community for more than four decades worth of time. Due to a quirk of topography, the half a hundred residents of Mödlareuth, a tiny settlement encircled by pine forests, fields and spectacular vistas, found themselves at the heart of the Cold War conflict. They had the misfortune to span Bavaria, in Western Germany, and Thuringia in the East, a boundary that was established first by a fence and then by a wall. United States military personnel dubbed it Mini Berlin.

Commemorating Historical Events

Several months after their own division was opened, and even before their country had unified again in 1990, a assembly of local people set about documenting their past. The effort is close to come to fruition: on 9 November, the 36th annual remembrance of the demolition of the Berlin Wall, the Museum of German Division Mödlareuth will begin operations. It was publicly inaugurated by the national president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in the beginning of October, but the display was not entirely prepared. Speaking to the locals who experienced the past era, Steinmeier said: “You were witnesses of an cruel split, which pulled families asunder and turned neighbours into foreigners.”

“You were observers of an cruel division, which pulled families into pieces and turned neighbors into foreigners.”

Historical Background

Starting at its establishment in 1810, the village straddled the Royal Bavaria and the Princely State of Reuss, a noble lineage most renowned for giving all its male descendants the name Heinrich and counting them consecutively by date of birth. As Steinmeier related to the audience, the oddity did not stand in the path of the locals gathering in the identical inn, attending the same place of worship and placing their children to the same school.

Post-War Division

Then came the second world war. The moment they arrived, the Soviet forces installed wooden posts by the brook. For a year they seized the complete village, setting up their headquarters in a building on the Bavarian territory side, decorating it with a portrait of Stalin and a Soviet emblem. The Americans persuaded them to pull back back over the stream. For a period, locals could still cross over, though as controls became stricter they were required to present identity papers, although all understood who they were, and to come back at evening.

Increase of Frontier Measures

Subsequently, in 1952, came barbed wire and the legal sealing of the frontier. In 1966, as in Berlin five years earlier, a wall was erected, with explosives, tank traps and watchtowers. The villagers could still see each other by ascending elevations, but on the eastern side gesturing and calling out were forbidden. A local woman was placed on a Stasi watch list for replying “back at you” to a western resident who said her “prosperous new year”.

Heritage Site Creation

It was related to me accounts such as these tales by Robert Lebegern, the director of the museum, who has spent a large part of his occupational time developing it. Villagers were consulted in the initial phases about how much structure they wished to preserve. They opted for a portion on the west edge, adjacent to where a local resident was able to flee in the darkest hours with a scaling tool, following which the border was heavily strengthened.

Conserved Structures

Two watchtowers are preserved in addition to a series of displays illustrating the most significant moments in the hamlet’s history. As we walk, Robert Lebegern lists the rules: nobody could approach 5km of the frontier. Farmers needed special permission to look after their fields; the partner could operate the combine harvester but under no circumstances both, in case they sought to escape. Military personnel were on duty.

Larger Context

The frontier between West Germany and the GDR extended 1,400 kilometers, from the northern sea in the north to this location in the south. Berlin is remembered and memorialised the most frequently, but more than twice as many persons (well over 300) were killed trying to pass over it in countryside regions than in the big city. Robert Lebegern informs me that 95% of escape attempts did not succeed.

Village Life

The greater part of Mödlareuth’s residents were agricultural workers or skilled workers, who adapted to living in the uncertain territory between a pair of belief systems by avoiding attention and caring for their farms. They nor did they supported the socialist government nor resisted it, the director clarifies.

Interest

For sightseers, however, the village became a sort of site of interest. About 15k came to visit each year, viewing tools in hand, to look – and then swiftly depart. In 1983, the United States leader, George Bush, was given a tour by the national security head.

Twenty five years after merger, the TV show, a TV series about a imaginary village similar to Mödlareuth, resulted in new attention.

Present-Day Developments

The inauguration of the recently established museum – with a coffee shop, shop, film screening area and large vehicle area – is expected to