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An stream so shallow you scarcely got your feet wet divided a village for over four decades of time. By an accident of landscape, the half a hundred residents of Mödlareuth, a hamlet bordered by evergreen groves, meadows and breathtaking scenery, found themselves at the heart of the cold war. They had the bad luck to span Bavaria, in Western Germany, and Thuringia in the Soviet sector, a border that was demarcated first by a enclosure and then by a partition. American soldiers dubbed it Small Berlin.

Preserving Historical Events

Several months after their own division was breached, and even before their country had reunified in 1990, a collection of villagers started memorialising their history. The project is about to come to fruition: on 9 November, the thirty-sixth anniversary of the demolition of the German barrier, the Deutsch-Deutsches Museum Mödlareuth will inaugurate. It was formally launched by the national president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in early October, but the display wasn’t quite finished. Speaking to the villagers who endured the past era, Steinmeier remarked: “You were witnesses of an cruel division, which tore households apart and turned neighbours into strangers.”

“You were observers of an brutal split, which pulled households apart and turned neighbors into foreigners.”

Past Context

Even at its creation in 1810, the community straddled the Royal Bavaria and the Principality of Reuss, a noble lineage best known for bestowing all its men the designation Heinrich and counting them consecutively by birth order. As Steinmeier told the gathering, the peculiarity did not stand in the manner of the locals socializing in the same tavern, visiting the same church and sending their children to the same learning center.

Post-War Division

Then came the second world war. Immediately after they came, the Russian troops put up timber poles by the brook. For a twelve months they took over the entire village, establishing their control center in a dwelling on the western side, decorating it with a image of Stalin and a red star. The Americans persuaded them to retreat across the creek. For a period, villagers could still cross over, though as limitations became stricter they were forced to show identity papers, although each person understood who they were, and to come back at night.

Increase of Border Controls

Subsequently, in 1952, came metal barriers and the formal sealing of the frontier. In 1966, as in Berlin five years earlier, a concrete structure was built, with explosives, anti-tank obstacles and guard posts. The residents could still see each other by ascending elevations, but on the east side waving and calling out were prohibited. A local woman was put on a GDR intelligence surveillance list for responding “back at you” to a West German resident who said her “happy new year”.

Museum Creation

I was told narratives such as these incidents by Robert Lebegern, the museum’s director, who has spent a significant portion of his professional career building it. Residents were polled at an early stage about how what length of structure they desired to preserve. They selected a portion on the west fringe, close to where a local resident managed to flee in the middle of the night with a ladder, after which the frontier was heavily fortified.

Maintained Structures

Two watchtowers are preserved in addition to a set of exhibits showing the most impactful moments in the hamlet’s history. As we stroll, Robert Lebegern details the regulations: nobody could come within 5km of the border. Rural residents had to obtain specific authorization to care for their crops; the husband or wife could work the agricultural equipment but under no circumstances both, lest they sought to escape. Armed guards stood watch.

Broader Background

The boundary between West Germany and the East Germany ran nearly 900 miles, from the Baltic Sea in the north to here in the south. Berlin is remembered and documented the most, but in excess of two times more persons (well over 300) lost their lives seeking to cross it in countryside regions than in the big city. the director reminds me that 95% of escape attempts did not succeed.

Community Existence

The majority of Mödlareuth’s villagers were agricultural workers or artisans, who adapted to dwelling in the grey zone between two political systems by keeping their heads down and tending to their farms. They neither backed the East German authorities nor opposed it, Robert Lebegern states.

Visitors

For sightseers, however, the hamlet became a type of site of interest. Approximately 15,000 came to visit each year, binoculars in hand, to gawp – and then quickly go away. In 1983, the United States leader, George Bush, was given a tour by the German defense official.

Twenty-five years after reunification, Tannbach, a TV series about a fictional community resembling Mödlareuth, led to fresh curiosity.

Modern Evolutions

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