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A creek so low you barely got your ankles wet separated a community for over four decades worth of time. Because of a chance of topography, the half a hundred locals of Mödlareuth, a tiny settlement bordered by pine forests, pastures and spectacular vistas, found themselves at the center of the Cold War tensions. They had the misfortune to cross the Bavarian region, in the Federal Republic of Germany, and the Thuringian region in the East, a frontier that was demarcated first by a fence and then by a partition. United States military personnel dubbed it Little Berlin.

Commemorating Historical Events

A few months after their own barrier was torn down, and prior to their country had reunified in 1990, a assembly of local people set about memorialising their history. The effort is close to reach completion: on 9 November, the thirty-sixth remembrance of the collapse of the Wall in Berlin, the Deutsch-Deutsches Museum Mödlareuth will inaugurate. It was publicly launched by the national president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in the beginning of October, but the exhibition was not completely prepared. Addressing the villagers who experienced the former times, Steinmeier said: “You were witnesses of an cruel split, which ripped relatives asunder and turned neighbors into aliens.”

“You were observers of an cruel division, which ripped households apart and turned neighbors into aliens.”

Bygone Context

Starting at its founding in 1810, the community spanned the Royal Bavaria and the Reuss Principality, a princely house most renowned for assigning all its men the title Heinrich and labeling them in order by birth. As Steinmeier related to the gathering, the quirk was never an obstacle in the way of the inhabitants socializing in the identical tavern, visiting the same church and enrolling their kids to the same school.

Post-War Division

Then came the second world war. The moment they came, the Russian troops put up timber poles by the brook. For a year they seized the entire community, establishing their command in a building on the Bavarian territory side, decorating it with a picture of Stalin and a communist symbol. The American soldiers urged them to pull back to the other side of the brook. For a time, villagers could continue to cross over, though as restrictions became stricter they were required to present ID, despite the fact that each person was aware who they were, and to go back at evening.

Increase of Frontier Controls

After that, in 1952, came barbed wire and the official sealing of the boundary. In 1966, as in Berlin five years earlier, a wall was built, with mines, vehicle barriers and observation points. The residents could still see each other by scaling slopes, but on the eastern side signaling and shouting were banned. A local woman was put on a East German secret police watch list for replying “likewise” to a western resident who said her “prosperous new year”.

Heritage Site Development

I heard accounts including these by Robert Lebegern, the director of the museum, who has dedicated much of his professional career developing it. Residents were asked at an early stage about how how long a section barrier they wished to preserve. They selected a section on the western fringe, adjacent to where a local resident managed to get away in the dead of night with a scaling tool, subsequently the boundary was substantially reinforced.

Preserved Buildings

2 watchtowers are conserved alongside a collection of tableaux showing the most impactful events in the village’s past. As we stroll, the director lists the restrictions: no one could come within 5km of the boundary. Agricultural workers required special permission to tend to their produce; the partner could use the agricultural equipment but under no circumstances the pair, in case they attempted to escape. Soldiers were on duty.

Larger Perspective

The boundary between the Federal Republic and the East Germany extended nearly 900 miles, from the Baltic coast in the northern part to here in the southern region. Berlin is recalled and memorialised the greatest, but more than two times more individuals (more than 300) were killed trying to cross it in rural areas than in the urban center. Lebegern tells me that 95 percent of escape attempts were unsuccessful.

Village Life

The greater part of Mödlareuth’s residents were farmers or artisans, who adjusted to living in the grey zone between a pair of ideological spheres by staying low-profile and tending to their land. They nor did they supported the East German authorities nor opposed it, Lebegern states.

Visitors

For sightseers, however, the hamlet became a kind of destination. About 15k came to visit annually, binoculars in possession, to stare – and then rapidly depart. In 1983, the US president, George Bush, was guided by the German defence minister.

Twenty five years after merger, the television series, a TV series about a fictional hamlet similar to Mödlareuth, resulted in new attention.

Modern Developments

The inauguration of the recently established museum – with a cafe, store, film screening area and large parking lot – is likely to