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An stream so low you barely got your feet wet split a community for in excess of four decades worth of time. Because of a chance of geography, the 50 locals of Mödlareuth, a small village surrounded by pine forests, pastures and stunning views, found themselves at the center of the cold war. They had the unfortunate circumstance to span the Bavarian region, in Western Germany, and the Thuringian region in the Eastern part, a frontier that was established first by a barrier and then by a barricade. United States military personnel nicknamed it Small Berlin.

Preserving the Past

A few months after their own barrier was torn down, and even before their country had become one in 1990, a group of residents set about commemorating their heritage. The project is about to reach completion: on 9 November, the thirty-sixth commemoration of the demolition of the Wall in Berlin, the Museum of German Division Mödlareuth will open. It was publicly inaugurated by the national president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in the first part of October, but the display was not entirely finished. Addressing the residents who lived through the old days, Steinmeier said: “You were bystanders of an inhuman division, which pulled relatives asunder and turned local residents into strangers.”

“You were bystanders of an inhuman split, which tore relatives asunder and turned neighbours into aliens.”

Historical Context

Even at its founding in 1810, the hamlet cut across the Royal Bavaria and the Princely State of Reuss, a noble lineage most famous for giving all its men the title Heinrich and numbering them sequentially by birth. As Steinmeier informed the gathering, the peculiarity did not stand in the path of the locals gathering in the identical inn, going to the very same church and sending their young ones to the same educational institution.

Post-War Division

Then came the global conflict. The moment they arrived, the Russians installed wooden posts by the brook. For a year they seized the entire village, establishing their control center in a dwelling on the Bavarian side, embellishing it with a image of Stalin and a communist symbol. The Americans urged them to withdraw back over the creek. For a period, residents could still hop over, though as controls increased they were forced to present identity papers, despite the fact that all knew who they were, and to return at evening.

Intensification of Border Controls

After that, in 1952, came wire fencing and the legal shutting of the frontier. In 1966, as in Berlin five years earlier, a wall was built, with landmines, vehicle barriers and observation points. The villagers could continue to observe each other by ascending hills, but on the eastern side gesturing and shouting were banned. A female resident was put on a East German secret police monitoring list for responding “back at you” to a western resident who wished her “good new year”.

Heritage Site Creation

I was told stories like these incidents by Robert Lebegern, the head of the institution, who has spent a large part of his professional career developing it. Locals were consulted in the initial phases about how what length of wall they wished to keep. They chose a section on the west fringe, close to where a villager managed to flee in the middle of the night with a scaling tool, subsequently the border was heavily fortified.

Maintained Buildings

A pair of observation towers are preserved in addition to a collection of displays illustrating the most significant moments in the community’s chronicle. As we stroll, Lebergen enumerates the restrictions: not a single person could approach 5km of the frontier. Agricultural workers had to obtain specific authorization to look after their produce; the spouse could work the agricultural equipment but under no circumstances the pair, in case they sought to flee. Military personnel were on duty.

Broader Perspective

The frontier between Western Germany and the GDR extended nearly 900 miles, from the Baltic Sea in the northern part to here in the southern region. Berlin is recalled and memorialised the greatest, but over twice as many people (exceeding 300) were killed attempting to pass over it in countryside regions than in the big city. Robert Lebegern reminds me that almost all of efforts to cross were unsuccessful.

Village Daily Living

The majority of Mödlareuth’s locals were agricultural workers or craftsmen, who accommodated to dwelling in the ambiguous area between two ideological spheres by keeping their heads down and caring for their fields. They nor did they supported the socialist government nor resisted it, Robert Lebegern explains.

Visitors

For sightseers, however, the settlement became a type of site of interest. About fifteen thousand came to see each year, viewing tools in possession, to stare – and then swiftly depart. In 1983, the US president, George Bush, was shown around by the German defence minister.

Twenty five years after reunification, the television series, a TV series about a made-up hamlet similar to Mödlareuth, caused fresh attention.

Current Evolutions

The launch of the new museum – with a coffee shop, store, movie theater and sizable parking lot – is expected to