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An creek so narrow you hardly got your ankles wet divided a community for more than four decades. Because of a chance of topography, the fifty residents of Mödlareuth, a small village bordered by coniferous woods, fields and breathtaking views, found themselves at the heart of the Cold War tensions. They had the unfortunate circumstance to straddle Bavaria, in Western Germany, and Thuringia in the Eastern part, a border that was demarcated first by a barrier and then by a partition. United States military personnel nicknamed it Small Berlin.

Memorialising Historical Events

Months after their own barrier was torn down, and even before their state had reunified in 1990, a group of local people started documenting their heritage. The work is soon to reach completion: on 9 November, the 36th remembrance of the collapse of the Wall in Berlin, the Museum of German Division Mödlareuth will inaugurate. It was formally inaugurated by the federal president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in the first part of October, but the display was not completely finished. Addressing the residents who lived through the former times, Steinmeier stated: “You were bystanders of an brutal division, which pulled relatives apart and turned local residents into strangers.”

“You were bystanders of an brutal split, which ripped households asunder and turned local residents into strangers.”

Bygone Origins

Even at its creation in 1810, the village straddled the Royal Bavaria and the Princely State of Reuss, a royal family best known for bestowing all its men the title Heinrich and labeling them consecutively by birth order. As Steinmeier told the gathering, the quirk was never an obstacle in the manner of the locals drinking in the identical tavern, attending the very same religious building and placing their children to the same educational institution.

After the War Separation

Then came the World War II. As soon as they came, the Russian troops erected wooden posts by the brook. For a annual period they seized the entire community, creating their control center in a building on the western side, adorning it with a image of Stalin and a red star. The American soldiers persuaded them to withdraw across the stream. For a period, locals could still cross over, though as limitations increased they were obliged to present ID, despite the fact that each person understood who they were, and to go back at evening.

Increase of Boundary Restrictions

Subsequently, in 1952, came metal barriers and the formal sealing of the boundary. In 1966, as in Berlin five years earlier, a concrete structure was erected, with mines, vehicle barriers and observation points. The villagers could still observe each other by climbing elevations, but on the east side waving and shouting were forbidden. A local woman was put on a GDR intelligence watch list for answering “likewise” to a Bavarian local who wished her “prosperous new year”.

Exhibition Center Development

I was told narratives including these tales by Robert Lebegern, the museum’s director, who has dedicated a significant portion of his working life developing it. Residents were asked in the initial phases about how how long a section barrier they wanted to keep. They selected a portion on the western edge, near where one of their own managed to get away in the dead of night with a climbing device, after which the frontier was heavily reinforced.

Maintained Installations

Two observation towers are maintained alongside a collection of displays depicting the most significant dates in the hamlet’s chronicle. As we stroll, Robert Lebegern lists the rules: no one could get closer than 5km of the frontier. Rural residents required special permission to tend to their fields; the spouse could operate the combine harvester but under no circumstances both, for fear that they tried to flee. Armed guards kept guard.

Wider Background

The frontier between Western Germany and the German Democratic Republic ran 1,400km, from the Baltic coast in the north to here in the south. Berlin is recalled and memorialised the greatest, but in excess of double the number people (well over 300) lost their lives seeking to traverse it in countryside regions than in the urban center. Lebegern reminds me that 95% of attempts to flee failed.

Community Existence

The greater part of Mödlareuth’s villagers were farmers or skilled workers, who adapted to dwelling in the uncertain territory between 2 ideological spheres by keeping their heads down and tending to their farms. They did not backed the communist regime nor opposed it, Robert Lebegern clarifies.

Tourism

For visitors, however, the settlement became a sort of destination. Approximately 15,000 came to see annually, optical devices in hand, to look – and then quickly leave. In 1983, the American president, George Bush, was shown around by the German defence minister.

Twenty-five years after merger, the TV show, a television program about a fictional community similar to Mödlareuth, caused fresh interest.

Modern Changes

The inauguration of the modern exhibition center – with a coffee shop, shop, film screening area and sizable vehicle area – is expected to