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A brook so low you scarcely got your feet wet separated a village for in excess of four decades worth of time. Because of a chance of geography, the fifty locals of Mödlareuth, a small village encircled by pine forests, fields and breathtaking views, found themselves at the heart of the Cold War tensions. They had the unfortunate circumstance to cross Bavaria, in the Federal Republic of Germany, and Thuringia in the Eastern part, a border that was demarcated first by a fence and then by a barricade. American soldiers called it Small Berlin.

Memorialising History

Several months after their own division was torn down, and before their nation had reunified in 1990, a collection of residents set about documenting their past. The project is about to reach completion: on 9 November, the 36th annual remembrance of the demolition of the German barrier, the Museum of German Division Mödlareuth will begin operations. It was publicly opened by the federal president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in the beginning of October, but the exhibition was not entirely finished. Addressing the locals who experienced the old days, Steinmeier remarked: “You were witnesses of an cruel division, which ripped households asunder and turned local residents into strangers.”

“You were witnesses of an inhuman division, which tore families apart and turned neighbours into strangers.”

Historical Background

Even at its creation in 1810, the village cut across the Kingdom of Bavaria and the Principality of Reuss, a noble lineage most renowned for assigning all its male members the designation Heinrich and labeling them in order by date of birth. As Steinmeier told the crowd, the oddity never stood in the manner of the locals socializing in the identical pub, visiting the identical church and enrolling their young ones to the same learning center.

Following WWII Division

Then came the second world war. Immediately after they arrived, the Soviet forces installed timber poles by the creek. For a year they occupied the whole village, setting up their headquarters in a building on the Bavarian territory side, embellishing it with a portrait of Stalin and a red star. The Americans urged them to withdraw across the stream. For a while, villagers could still hop over, though as limitations increased they were required to display ID, although all knew who they were, and to go back at night.

Escalation of Frontier Restrictions

After that, in 1952, came barbed wire and the legal closing of the frontier. In 1966, as in Berlin five years earlier, a wall was erected, with landmines, vehicle barriers and observation points. The villagers could continue to see each other by ascending elevations, but on the Soviet side gesturing and shouting were forbidden. A female resident was put on a East German secret police surveillance list for responding “back at you” to a western local who wished her “prosperous new year”.

Heritage Site Creation

I heard accounts such as these tales by Robert Lebegern, the director of the museum, who has devoted a large part of his professional career building it. Residents were consulted in the initial phases about how what length of wall they wanted to keep. They selected a portion on the western fringe, near where a villager managed to escape in the darkest hours with a ladder, after which the border was heavily strengthened.

Maintained Buildings

2 observation towers are maintained together with a set of tableaux showing the most significant moments in the hamlet’s history. As we stroll, Robert Lebegern lists the regulations: no one could come within 5km of the frontier. Farmers needed particular approval to tend to their crops; the spouse could operate the harvesting machine but never the pair, for fear that they sought to flee. Soldiers kept guard.

Wider Background

The border between Western Germany and the German Democratic Republic stretched 1,400km, from the northern sea in the north to this location in the southern region. Berlin is commemorated and memorialised the most frequently, but over two times more people (more than 300) died seeking to cross it in countryside regions than in the big city. Robert Lebegern reminds me that 95 percent of efforts to cross were unsuccessful.

Community Daily Living

The greater part of Mödlareuth’s villagers were rural laborers or skilled workers, who accommodated to living in the uncertain territory between 2 ideological spheres by staying low-profile and caring for their fields. They neither backed the communist regime nor opposed it, the director states.

Interest

For tourists, however, the settlement became a sort of pilgrimage. Roughly 15,000 came to see every year, optical devices in their hands, to stare – and then quickly depart. In 1983, the United States leader, George Bush, was shown around by the national security head.

Twenty five years after unification, the television series, a broadcast production about a made-up community resembling Mödlareuth, resulted in fresh curiosity.

Current Changes

The launch of the recently established museum – with a restaurant, store, cinema room and large vehicle area – is probable to