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An creek so shallow you barely got your feet wet split a community for in excess of four decades of time. By an accident of geography, the fifty inhabitants of Mödlareuth, a small village surrounded by pine forests, pastures and spectacular views, found themselves at the heart of the Cold War conflict. They had the misfortune to span Bavaria, in the Federal Republic of Germany, and Thuringia in the Soviet sector, a border that was demarcated first by a barrier and then by a wall. US troops nicknamed it Small Berlin.

Memorialising the Past

A few months after their own barrier was opened, and even before their state had unified again in 1990, a collection of villagers set about commemorating their past. The effort is soon to be completed: on 9 November, the 36th annual remembrance of the fall of the Wall in Berlin, the German-German Museum Mödlareuth will begin operations. It was officially inaugurated by the federal president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in the first part of October, but the display was not completely prepared. Telling the residents who lived through the old days, Steinmeier remarked: “You were observers of an brutal separation, which ripped families into pieces and turned local residents into strangers.”

“You were observers of an inhuman separation, which pulled families into pieces and turned neighbours into strangers.”

Past Context

Right from its founding in 1810, the community straddled the Royal Bavaria and the Reuss Principality, a princely house best known for bestowing all its male members the name Heinrich and labeling them in order by birth. As Steinmeier related to the crowd, the peculiarity did not stand in the manner of the inhabitants socializing in the very same tavern, visiting the very same church and placing their kids to the very same school.

After the War Separation

Next arrived the second world war. The moment they arrived, the Russians put up timber poles by the stream. For a annual period they seized the complete hamlet, creating their command in a dwelling on the Bavarian territory side, adorning it with a image of Stalin and a communist symbol. The Americans persuaded them to withdraw to the other side of the brook. For a while, villagers could still jump across, though as restrictions increased they were forced to display ID, even though each person understood who they were, and to come back at night.

Increase of Boundary Controls

After that, in 1952, came wire fencing and the official shutting of the boundary. In 1966, as in Berlin previously in 1961, a barrier was constructed, with landmines, vehicle barriers and watchtowers. The residents could still view each other by scaling elevations, but on the eastern side signaling and calling out were prohibited. A female resident was placed on a Stasi surveillance list for responding “same to you” to a Bavarian resident who greeted her “prosperous new year”.

Exhibition Center Development

It was related to me narratives like these incidents by Robert Lebegern, the director of the museum, who has devoted a significant portion of his working life developing it. Villagers were consulted early on about how what length of wall they wanted to keep. They chose a section on the western perimeter, close to where a local resident succeeded to escape in the middle of the night with a scaling tool, after which the frontier was heavily strengthened.

Maintained Structures

Two observation towers are maintained together with a series of displays showing the most impactful moments in the community’s history. As we move, the director enumerates the restrictions: no one could get closer than 5km of the boundary. Agricultural workers had to obtain specific authorization to care for their fields; the partner could use the agricultural equipment but never the pair, in case they tried to make a run for it. Military personnel kept guard.

Wider Background

The border between West Germany and the GDR stretched 1,400 kilometers, from the Baltic coast in the north to here in the south. Berlin is commemorated and documented the most, but more than two times more people (more than 300) lost their lives attempting to pass over it in countryside regions than in the metropolis. the director informs me that 95 percent of escape attempts failed.

Hamlet Daily Living

Most of Mödlareuth’s locals were rural laborers or skilled workers, who accommodated to living in the grey zone between two political systems by keeping their heads down and caring for their fields. They nor did they supported the communist regime nor resisted it, Lebegern states.

Visitors

For visitors, however, the settlement became a kind of pilgrimage. Approximately 15,000 came to see each year, binoculars in their hands, to stare – and then swiftly leave. In 1983, the American president, George Bush, was given a tour by the German defense official.

Twenty five years after merger, the television series, a television program about a fictional hamlet like Mödlareuth, caused new attention.

Modern Evolutions

The launch of the modern exhibition center – with a restaurant, store, film screening area and large vehicle area – is probable to