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An creek so low you barely got your feet wet separated a village for over four decades. By an accident of topography, the 50 inhabitants of Mödlareuth, a hamlet encircled by pine forests, fields and stunning vistas, found themselves at the center of the cold war. They had the unfortunate circumstance to cross Bavaria, in the Federal Republic of Germany, and Thuringia in the East, a frontier that was demarcated first by a enclosure and then by a wall. American soldiers dubbed it Little Berlin.

Memorialising the Past

A few months after their own division was torn down, and even before their nation had reunified in 1990, a group of local people set about documenting their history. The effort is about to come to fruition: on 9 November, the thirty-sixth remembrance of the demolition of the Wall in Berlin, the German-German Museum Mödlareuth will open. It was formally opened by the national president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in the beginning of October, but the show was not entirely finished. Telling the villagers who endured the old days, Steinmeier remarked: “You were witnesses of an cruel split, which tore families asunder and turned local residents into strangers.”

“You were witnesses of an inhuman split, which pulled relatives asunder and turned local residents into foreigners.”

Historical Origins

Even at its creation in 1810, the hamlet cut across the Kingdom of Bavaria and the Princely State of Reuss, a princely house most famous for bestowing all its men the designation Heinrich and numbering them sequentially by date of birth. As Steinmeier related to the audience, the peculiarity never stood in the path of the residents socializing in the identical inn, going to the identical religious building and placing their children to the same school.

Following WWII Split

Subsequently occurred the global conflict. Immediately after they arrived, the Russian troops erected timber poles by the stream. For a twelve months they occupied the entire village, establishing their command in a house on the Bavarian side, adorning it with a picture of Stalin and a Soviet emblem. The American soldiers urged them to retreat back over the stream. For a while, locals could still jump across, though as limitations increased they were forced to display identification, despite the fact that everyone understood who they were, and to come back at after dark.

Escalation of Border Measures

Then, in 1952, came wire fencing and the formal shutting of the frontier. In 1966, as in Berlin half a decade before, a wall was built, with landmines, vehicle barriers and watchtowers. The locals could still observe each other by climbing elevations, but on the east side signaling and calling out were forbidden. One woman was added to a East German secret police monitoring list for answering “same to you” to a West German villager who wished her “prosperous new year”.

Exhibition Center Creation

I heard accounts such as these tales by Robert Lebegern, the head of the institution, who has spent a large part of his working life creating it. Residents were consulted in the initial phases about how how long a section wall they wished to maintain. They chose a portion on the west perimeter, close to where one of their own succeeded to get away in the darkest hours with a ladder, following which the boundary was heavily reinforced.

Conserved Installations

Two watchtowers are preserved together with a set of displays illustrating the most dramatic events in the village’s history. As we move, the director enumerates the regulations: no one could approach 5km of the frontier. Farmers required specific authorization to care for their fields; the partner could use the agricultural equipment but under no circumstances both, lest they sought to flee. Soldiers were on duty.

Broader Perspective

The boundary between West Germany and the GDR ran nearly 900 miles, from the Baltic coast in the north to this location in the south. Berlin is recalled and documented the most, but in excess of two times more individuals (exceeding 300) died attempting to traverse it in countryside regions than in the metropolis. Robert Lebegern informs me that 95% of escape attempts were unsuccessful.

Village Daily Living

The greater part of Mödlareuth’s locals were agricultural workers or skilled workers, who adapted to residing in the ambiguous area between 2 ideological spheres by staying low-profile and looking after their land. They nor did they endorsed the socialist government nor opposed it, the director clarifies.

Visitors

For tourists, however, the hamlet became a sort of site of interest. About 15k came to see every year, viewing tools in hand, to look – and then swiftly depart. In 1983, the United States leader, George Bush, was shown around by the German defense official.

25 years after merger, the TV show, a broadcast production about a imaginary hamlet similar to Mödlareuth, resulted in fresh curiosity.

Modern Changes

The opening of the recently established museum – with a coffee shop, boutique, movie theater and big parking lot – is likely to