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A stream so shallow you hardly got your feet wet divided a village for more than four decades worth of time. By an accident of geography, the half a hundred locals of Mödlareuth, a tiny settlement encircled by coniferous woods, pastures and stunning views, found themselves at the core of the Cold War tensions. They had the bad luck to straddle the Bavarian region, in the Federal Republic of Germany, and Thuringia in the Soviet sector, a boundary that was established first by a fence and then by a partition. United States military personnel dubbed it Little Berlin.

Preserving the Past

A few months after their own wall was opened, and prior to their nation had become one in 1990, a collection of villagers started commemorating their history. The effort is about to reach completion: on 9 November, the thirty-sixth anniversary of the demolition of the Berlin Wall, the Deutsch-Deutsches Museum Mödlareuth will begin operations. It was formally launched by the national president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in early October, but the show wasn’t quite ready. Telling the locals who experienced the past era, Steinmeier remarked: “You were bystanders of an cruel division, which ripped families apart and turned neighbours into strangers.”

“You were observers of an inhuman split, which ripped households apart and turned neighbours into foreigners.”

Bygone Background

Even at its founding in 1810, the community straddled the Royal Bavaria and the Reuss Principality, a noble lineage most renowned for giving all its men the designation Heinrich and labeling them in order by birth. As Steinmeier told the gathering, the peculiarity did not stand in the path of the inhabitants drinking in the same pub, going to the very same church and placing their young ones to the very same school.

Following WWII Division

Next arrived the World War II. The moment they appeared, the Soviet forces erected wood stakes by the brook. For a twelve months they seized the complete hamlet, setting up their control center in a dwelling on the western side, embellishing it with a picture of Stalin and a communist symbol. The Americans urged them to withdraw to the other side of the stream. For a period, locals could still jump across, though as limitations increased they were required to display identity papers, although everyone was aware who they were, and to go back at after dark.

Increase of Frontier Measures

After that, in 1952, came wire fencing and the formal closing of the boundary. In 1966, as in Berlin previously in 1961, a wall was erected, with explosives, anti-tank obstacles and observation points. The villagers could continue to view each other by scaling hills, but on the east side signaling and shouting were prohibited. One woman was added to a GDR intelligence monitoring list for replying “same to you” to a Bavarian villager who greeted her “prosperous new year”.

Museum Development

I heard stories like these tales by Robert Lebegern, the head of the institution, who has dedicated much of his working life developing it. Residents were consulted early on about how how long a section structure they desired to keep. They selected a portion on the western edge, close to where a villager managed to flee in the middle of the night with a scaling tool, subsequently the frontier was significantly fortified.

Conserved Structures

2 observation towers are conserved alongside a set of displays depicting the most dramatic events in the community’s history. As we walk, the director lists the regulations: no one could come within 5km of the frontier. Farmers required special permission to care for their fields; the husband or wife could use the agricultural equipment but under no circumstances the pair, in case they sought to flee. Armed guards were on duty.

Wider Perspective

The boundary between Western Germany and the German Democratic Republic stretched 1,400km, from the Baltic Sea in the northern part to this location in the southern region. Berlin is remembered and memorialised the most frequently, but over twice as many individuals (well over 300) were killed attempting to cross it in rural areas than in the urban center. the director tells me that 95 percent of efforts to cross failed.

Village Existence

The greater part of Mödlareuth’s locals were farmers or craftsmen, who adapted to residing in the grey zone between a pair of belief systems by keeping their heads down and looking after their farms. They neither backed the socialist government nor fought it, Lebegern states.

Visitors

For tourists, however, the settlement became a kind of destination. Approximately fifteen thousand came to see each year, optical devices in hand, to gawp – and then swiftly leave. In 1983, the American president, George Bush, was guided by the German defence minister.

Twenty-five years after merger, Tannbach, a broadcast production about a fictional hamlet like Mödlareuth, caused fresh curiosity.

Modern Developments

The launch of the recently established museum – with a coffee shop, boutique, movie theater and big parking lot – is expected to