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An creek so low you barely got your ankles wet divided a settlement for more than four decades worth of time. By an accident of topography, the fifty inhabitants of Mödlareuth, a tiny settlement encircled by evergreen groves, fields and spectacular scenery, found themselves at the core of the cold war. They had the unfortunate circumstance to straddle Bavaria, in Western Germany, and Thuringia in the East, a border that was demarcated first by a barrier and then by a barricade. US troops dubbed it Little Berlin.

Commemorating History

A few months after their own division was opened, and before their nation had reunified in 1990, a collection of residents started commemorating their past. The effort is soon to come to fruition: on 9 November, the 36th remembrance of the fall of the German barrier, the German-German Museum Mödlareuth will begin operations. It was formally inaugurated by the federal president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in the beginning of October, but the show was not entirely prepared. Addressing the locals who endured the former times, Steinmeier remarked: “You were witnesses of an cruel division, which tore households into pieces and turned neighbors into strangers.”

“You were bystanders of an brutal split, which pulled relatives apart and turned neighbours into aliens.”

Historical Context

Even at its founding in 1810, the community spanned the Bavarian Kingdom and the Principality of Reuss, a royal family most renowned for bestowing all its male descendants the designation Heinrich and labeling them in order by date of birth. As Steinmeier informed the audience, the oddity was never an obstacle in the path of the locals gathering in the very same pub, going to the identical religious building and enrolling their children to the same school.

Following WWII Split

Next arrived the second world war. As soon as they appeared, the Russian troops installed wooden posts by the creek. For a twelve months they seized the whole village, creating their headquarters in a building on the Bavarian side, decorating it with a portrait of Stalin and a communist symbol. The American soldiers persuaded them to pull back to the other side of the stream. For a while, locals could continue to cross over, though as restrictions tightened they were required to show ID, even though each person knew who they were, and to return at evening.

Escalation of Frontier Controls

Then, in 1952, came wire fencing and the formal sealing of the frontier. In 1966, as in Berlin previously in 1961, a concrete structure was erected, with mines, vehicle barriers and watchtowers. The villagers could still see each other by ascending slopes, but on the Soviet side gesturing and shouting were forbidden. A female resident was added to a East German secret police monitoring list for replying “same to you” to a western resident who wished her “prosperous new year”.

Museum Creation

It was related to me accounts such as these tales by Robert Lebegern, the head of the institution, who has spent much of his professional career developing it. Villagers were polled early on about how much barrier they wanted to maintain. They opted for a portion on the Bavarian perimeter, adjacent to where one of their own was able to get away in the middle of the night with a climbing device, after which the frontier was significantly reinforced.

Conserved Installations

2 guard towers are maintained together with a series of displays showing the most dramatic events in the village’s past. As we stroll, Robert Lebegern lists the regulations: not a single person could get closer than 5km of the frontier. Farmers needed special permission to care for their fields; the husband or wife could operate the agricultural equipment but under no circumstances both, in case they tried to escape. Military personnel kept guard.

Larger Background

The boundary between Western Germany and the GDR stretched 1,400km, from the Baltic coast in the north to this location in the southern region. Berlin is commemorated and honored the most, but over two times more persons (more than 300) lost their lives seeking to traverse it in provincial zones than in the metropolis. Lebegern tells me that 95% of attempts to flee failed.

Community Existence

Most of Mödlareuth’s locals were rural laborers or craftsmen, who adapted to dwelling in the ambiguous area between two belief systems by avoiding attention and tending to their fields. They nor did they supported the socialist government nor fought it, the director explains.

Tourism

For visitors, however, the settlement became a type of destination. About 15k came to visit annually, binoculars in their hands, to stare – and then swiftly go away. In 1983, the United States leader, George Bush, was given a tour by the national security head.

Twenty five years after unification, the TV show, a television program about a imaginary hamlet resembling Mödlareuth, led to new attention.

Present-Day Developments

The launch of the recently established museum – with a cafe, store, movie theater and large vehicle area – is probable to