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A brook so shallow you hardly got your feet wet divided a settlement for in excess of four decades worth of time. Due to a quirk of topography, the half a hundred inhabitants of Mödlareuth, a hamlet surrounded by evergreen groves, pastures and stunning scenery, found themselves at the center of the Cold War conflict. They had the misfortune to cross the Bavarian region, in West Germany, and the Thuringian region in the Soviet sector, a border that was marked first by a barrier and then by a wall. US troops dubbed it Small Berlin.

Commemorating Historical Events

Months after their own wall was breached, and even before their country had become one in 1990, a collection of villagers began commemorating their past. The project is close to be completed: on 9 November, the thirty-sixth anniversary of the demolition of the German barrier, the German-German Museum Mödlareuth will open. It was formally opened by the federal president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in the beginning of October, but the display was not completely ready. Telling the villagers who endured the old days, Steinmeier said: “You were witnesses of an cruel division, which tore families apart and turned neighbors into aliens.”

“You were observers of an inhuman split, which pulled relatives apart and turned neighbors into aliens.”

Historical Context

Starting at its establishment in 1810, the community spanned the Kingdom of Bavaria and the Princely State of Reuss, a noble lineage best known for giving all its male members the title Heinrich and counting them consecutively by birth order. As Steinmeier informed the audience, the oddity never stood in the way of the inhabitants gathering in the identical tavern, visiting the same religious building and enrolling their young ones to the identical educational institution.

Following WWII Separation

Then came the World War II. The moment they appeared, the Russians installed wooden posts by the creek. For a twelve months they took over the entire community, creating their control center in a house on the western side, decorating it with a image of Stalin and a red star. The American soldiers convinced them to withdraw across the stream. For a while, villagers could continue to hop over, though as restrictions increased they were forced to show ID, even though everyone knew who they were, and to come back at after dark.

Intensification of Border Controls

After that, in 1952, came wire fencing and the official sealing of the frontier. In 1966, as in Berlin five years earlier, a barrier was constructed, with landmines, vehicle barriers and watchtowers. The residents could still observe each other by ascending slopes, but on the east side waving and calling out were prohibited. A local woman was added to a Stasi monitoring list for answering “likewise” to a Bavarian villager who said her “good new year”.

Heritage Site Establishment

I heard narratives like these tales by Robert Lebegern, the director of the museum, who has dedicated much of his occupational time creating it. Locals were polled early on about how much wall they wished to maintain. They selected a portion on the west edge, close to where a villager managed to get away in the darkest hours with a ladder, following which the boundary was significantly strengthened.

Conserved Buildings

2 guard towers are preserved alongside a series of displays illustrating the most impactful dates in the community’s chronicle. As we walk, the director details the regulations: not a single person could get closer than 5km of the boundary. Farmers needed specific authorization to care for their fields; the spouse could operate the combine harvester but never the pair, for fear that they sought to flee. Military personnel kept guard.

Broader Background

The border between Western Germany and the GDR ran 1,400km, from the Baltic Sea in the northern part to this location in the south. Berlin is commemorated and memorialised the most frequently, but in excess of twice as many people (exceeding 300) died attempting to cross it in rural areas than in the metropolis. Robert Lebegern tells me that 95 percent of efforts to cross were unsuccessful.

Hamlet Daily Living

The majority of Mödlareuth’s residents were agricultural workers or artisans, who accommodated to dwelling in the grey zone between a pair of ideological spheres by avoiding attention and caring for their land. They did not supported the East German authorities nor opposed it, the director explains.

Tourism

For tourists, however, the village became a kind of pilgrimage. Roughly fifteen thousand came to visit each year, binoculars in possession, to stare – and then rapidly depart. In 1983, the US president, George Bush, was given a tour by the German defence minister.

Twenty-five years after merger, the television series, a TV series about a made-up village resembling Mödlareuth, resulted in new attention.

Present-Day Developments

The inauguration of the new museum – with a cafe, store, film screening area and sizable car park – is expected to