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A brook so shallow you hardly got your ankles wet separated a community for more than four decades. Due to a quirk of landscape, the half a hundred inhabitants of Mödlareuth, a hamlet surrounded by evergreen groves, meadows and breathtaking views, found themselves at the center of the Cold War conflict. They had the unfortunate circumstance to cross the Bavarian region, in the Federal Republic of Germany, and the Thuringian region in the Soviet sector, a boundary that was marked first by a enclosure and then by a barricade. United States military personnel dubbed it Little Berlin.

Commemorating History

A few months after their own barrier was torn down, and before their country had become one in 1990, a assembly of local people began documenting their past. The project is about to come to fruition: on 9 November, the 36th remembrance of the fall of the Wall in Berlin, the Deutsch-Deutsches Museum Mödlareuth will open. It was officially inaugurated by the federal president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in early October, but the show was not entirely finished. Telling the residents who experienced the former times, Steinmeier remarked: “You were witnesses of an brutal separation, which pulled households into pieces and turned neighbours into foreigners.”

“You were witnesses of an cruel split, which pulled relatives apart and turned neighbours into strangers.”

Bygone Context

Starting at its establishment in 1810, the village spanned the Kingdom of Bavaria and the Reuss Principality, a noble lineage most famous for bestowing all its male members the name Heinrich and labeling them consecutively by date of birth. As Steinmeier told the crowd, the quirk did not stand in the way of the inhabitants drinking in the identical tavern, going to the identical religious building and placing their children to the very same learning center.

Following WWII Division

Next arrived the World War II. The moment they appeared, the Russian troops installed wooden posts by the stream. For a annual period they seized the complete community, setting up their headquarters in a building on the western side, adorning it with a portrait of Stalin and a red star. The Americans persuaded them to retreat to the other side of the creek. For a period, locals could continue to cross over, though as restrictions became stricter they were obliged to present identification, although everyone understood who they were, and to come back at evening.

Escalation of Frontier Controls

After that, in 1952, came barbed wire and the formal sealing of the frontier. In 1966, as in Berlin previously in 1961, a wall was constructed, with explosives, vehicle barriers and watchtowers. The locals could still see each other by scaling hills, but on the east side signaling and shouting were forbidden. A female resident was put on a Stasi monitoring list for replying “same to you” to a western local who wished her “good new year”.

Museum Development

I heard narratives like these tales by Robert Lebegern, the head of the institution, who has spent a large part of his occupational time developing it. Villagers were consulted in the initial phases about how much wall they wished to maintain. They selected a section on the west perimeter, adjacent to where one of their own managed to flee in the middle of the night with a scaling tool, subsequently the frontier was significantly fortified.

Conserved Installations

2 guard towers are maintained in addition to a collection of displays showing the most impactful dates in the village’s chronicle. As we walk, Lebergen enumerates the rules: nobody could approach 5km of the frontier. Farmers had to obtain special permission to tend to their crops; the partner could operate the agricultural equipment but under no circumstances both, in case they attempted to make a run for it. Soldiers kept guard.

Larger Perspective

The border between the Federal Republic and the German Democratic Republic extended 1,400 kilometers, from the Baltic coast in the north to here in the south. Berlin is recalled and documented the most, but in excess of twice as many persons (more than 300) lost their lives attempting to cross it in rural areas than in the big city. Lebegern informs me that 95 percent of escape attempts did not succeed.

Community Existence

The greater part of Mödlareuth’s villagers were agricultural workers or craftsmen, who adapted to residing in the ambiguous area between 2 political systems by staying low-profile and tending to their fields. They nor did they backed the communist regime nor opposed it, Lebegern clarifies.

Visitors

For tourists, however, the village became a sort of destination. About 15k visited annually, optical devices in their hands, to gawp – and then quickly leave. In 1983, the American president, George Bush, was guided by the German defense official.

Twenty five years after merger, the TV show, a broadcast production about a imaginary hamlet similar to Mödlareuth, led to renewed interest.

Current Developments

The opening of the recently established museum – with a coffee shop, store, film screening area and big car park – is likely to