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An creek so narrow you hardly got your feet wet separated a community for over four decades. Because of a chance of landscape, the fifty locals of Mödlareuth, a hamlet encircled by evergreen groves, meadows and spectacular vistas, found themselves at the heart of the Cold War tensions. They had the bad luck to straddle the Bavarian region, in Western Germany, and Thuringia in the Soviet sector, a frontier that was demarcated first by a barrier and then by a wall. American soldiers nicknamed it Little Berlin.

Commemorating the Past

Months after their own barrier was torn down, and before their country had unified again in 1990, a collection of residents set about memorialising their history. The project is soon to be completed: on 9 November, the thirty-sixth anniversary of the collapse of the Berlin Wall, the Museum of German Division Mödlareuth will begin operations. It was formally launched by the national president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in the beginning of October, but the show wasn’t quite prepared. Addressing the residents who experienced the past era, Steinmeier remarked: “You were bystanders of an cruel separation, which pulled families apart and turned neighbors into strangers.”

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

Historical Context

Right from its founding in 1810, the community cut across the Royal Bavaria and the Reuss Principality, a royal family best known for assigning all its male members the title Heinrich and numbering them sequentially by birth. As Steinmeier told the audience, the oddity never stood in the manner of the inhabitants gathering in the identical pub, going to the identical church and sending their young ones to the identical educational institution.

Following WWII Split

Next arrived the World War II. Immediately after they arrived, the Soviet forces put up wood stakes by the creek. For a twelve months they occupied the complete hamlet, establishing their command in a building on the western side, embellishing it with a image of Stalin and a Soviet emblem. The American soldiers convinced them to withdraw back over the creek. For a time, residents could still cross over, though as restrictions tightened they were required to present ID, even though all knew who they were, and to come back at night.

Intensification of Frontier Restrictions

After that, in 1952, came wire fencing and the official closing of the boundary. In 1966, as in Berlin half a decade before, a barrier was constructed, with explosives, vehicle barriers and observation points. The locals could continue to observe each other by climbing slopes, but on the Soviet side signaling and shouting were prohibited. One woman was put on a Stasi monitoring list for answering “likewise” to a West German local who wished her “happy new year”.

Exhibition Center Establishment

It was related to me narratives like these incidents by Robert Lebegern, the head of the institution, who has devoted much of his working life developing it. Locals were polled early on about how how long a section wall they wished to keep. They selected a section on the Bavarian edge, near where one of their own was able to escape in the middle of the night with a ladder, after which the border was heavily strengthened.

Preserved Installations

Two watchtowers are conserved in addition to a series of exhibits illustrating the most significant moments in the hamlet’s past. As we move, the director enumerates the rules: not a single person could approach 5km of the frontier. Rural residents required particular approval to tend to their fields; the husband or wife could work the agricultural equipment but under no circumstances the two, in case they sought to escape. Soldiers stood watch.

Broader Perspective

The boundary between Western Germany and the East Germany extended 1,400 kilometers, from the Baltic Sea in the northern part to the south in the southern region. Berlin is remembered and honored the greatest, but over double the number persons (well over 300) were killed seeking to traverse it in rural areas than in the big city. Lebegern reminds me that 95 percent of efforts to cross failed.

Hamlet Daily Living

The greater part of Mödlareuth’s villagers were farmers or craftsmen, who adapted to dwelling in the uncertain territory between a pair of ideological spheres by keeping their heads down and caring for their farms. They did not endorsed the socialist government nor resisted it, the director states.

Interest

For tourists, however, the settlement became a sort of destination. About 15k 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 national security head.

Twenty-five years after reunification, the TV show, a television program about a made-up community similar to Mödlareuth, resulted in fresh interest.

Present-Day Evolutions

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