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A creek so narrow you barely got your feet wet divided a village for over four decades. By an accident of geography, the fifty residents of Mödlareuth, a small village bordered by evergreen groves, fields and spectacular scenery, found themselves at the core of the Cold War conflict. They had the unfortunate circumstance to span the Bavarian region, in the Federal Republic of Germany, and Thuringia in the Soviet sector, a boundary that was established first by a barrier and then by a barricade. US troops called it Little Berlin.

Commemorating Historical Events

Several months after their own wall was breached, and prior to their state had become one in 1990, a collection of residents began memorialising their heritage. The work is about to reach completion: on 9 November, the 36th annual remembrance of the collapse of the German barrier, the Museum of German Division Mödlareuth will inaugurate. It was publicly opened by the national president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in early October, but the show wasn’t quite finished. Addressing the villagers who endured the old days, Steinmeier stated: “You were observers of an cruel separation, which tore families apart and turned neighbors into foreigners.”

“You were witnesses of an brutal separation, which ripped families into pieces and turned neighbours into strangers.”

Historical Context

Starting at its creation in 1810, the hamlet spanned the Kingdom of Bavaria and the Principality of Reuss, a royal family best known for giving all its male members the designation Heinrich and numbering them consecutively by birth order. As Steinmeier told the audience, the quirk did not stand in the path of the locals gathering in the same pub, going to the same church and sending their young ones to the identical educational institution.

Post-War Division

Then came the World War II. As soon as they appeared, the Soviet forces erected timber poles by the stream. For a annual period they seized the entire community, establishing their control center in a building on the western side, embellishing it with a image of Stalin and a communist symbol. The American soldiers urged them to retreat back over the stream. For a while, locals could still cross over, though as limitations increased they were forced to present ID, even though all understood who they were, and to go back at after dark.

Intensification of Boundary Restrictions

Then, in 1952, came metal barriers and the official sealing of the border. In 1966, as in Berlin previously in 1961, a barrier was erected, with explosives, tank traps and guard posts. The locals could still observe each other by scaling elevations, but on the east side waving and shouting were forbidden. One woman was put on a Stasi watch list for responding “back at you” to a Bavarian villager who wished her “prosperous new year”.

Museum Development

It was related to me accounts including these by Robert Lebegern, the head of the institution, who has devoted a large part of his working life building it. Locals were polled early on about how how long a section barrier they desired to preserve. They chose a portion on the Bavarian fringe, adjacent to where a villager was able to flee in the dead of night with a scaling tool, subsequently the frontier was heavily fortified.

Conserved Buildings

A pair of guard towers are maintained alongside a series of displays showing the most impactful moments in the village’s chronicle. As we move, Lebergen details the restrictions: no one could come within 5km of the border. Farmers needed special permission to care for their produce; the spouse could use the combine harvester but under no circumstances both, lest they sought to make a run for it. Armed guards kept guard.

Broader Perspective

The boundary between West Germany and the East Germany ran 1,400km, from the northern sea in the north to this location in the southern region. Berlin is commemorated and honored the most, but in excess of two times more persons (exceeding 300) died attempting to cross it in countryside regions than in the big city. the director informs me that 95 percent of efforts to cross were unsuccessful.

Village Life

The majority of Mödlareuth’s locals were agricultural workers or craftsmen, who accommodated to dwelling in the ambiguous area between 2 political systems by avoiding attention and looking after their farms. They did not endorsed the communist regime nor fought it, Robert Lebegern clarifies.

Interest

For sightseers, however, the hamlet became a sort of destination. About fifteen thousand visited every year, optical devices in hand, to stare – and then quickly go away. In 1983, the US president, George Bush, was shown around by the German defence minister.

Twenty five years after unification, the TV show, a TV series about a fictional community resembling Mödlareuth, caused renewed attention.

Current Changes

The opening of the recently established museum – with a cafe, store, cinema room and big parking lot – is expected to