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A creek so low you hardly got your ankles wet separated a settlement for more than four decades of time. Because of a chance of topography, the 50 residents of Mödlareuth, a hamlet surrounded by evergreen groves, meadows and breathtaking views, found themselves at the core of the cold war. They had the unfortunate circumstance to straddle the Bavarian region, in the Federal Republic of Germany, and the Thuringian region in the Eastern part, a frontier that was marked first by a fence and then by a wall. American soldiers nicknamed it Small Berlin.

Preserving History

A few months after their own barrier was opened, and before their state had become one in 1990, a collection of residents set about memorialising their history. The effort is soon to come to fruition: on 9 November, the 36th commemoration of the fall of the Wall in Berlin, the German-German Museum Mödlareuth will inaugurate. It was formally opened by the federal president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in early October, but the display was not completely prepared. Addressing the villagers who lived through the former times, Steinmeier remarked: “You were witnesses of an cruel split, which pulled families asunder and turned neighbours into aliens.”

“You were bystanders of an cruel split, which ripped families asunder and turned neighbours into aliens.”

Past Origins

Starting at its establishment in 1810, the community spanned the Kingdom of Bavaria and the Principality of Reuss, a royal family most renowned for bestowing all its men the name Heinrich and numbering them sequentially by birth. As Steinmeier related to the audience, the oddity was never an obstacle in the manner of the locals socializing in the very same tavern, attending the identical place of worship and placing their young ones to the same educational institution.

Following WWII Division

Then came the World War II. As soon as they came, the Russians put up wood stakes by the creek. For a annual period they took over the whole village, setting up their headquarters in a building on the Bavarian territory side, adorning it with a image of Stalin and a red star. The US forces urged them to withdraw to the other side of the stream. For a while, villagers could still cross over, though as restrictions tightened they were required to present identification, although everyone understood who they were, and to return at night.

Escalation of Border Measures

Then, in 1952, came barbed wire and the legal closing of the border. In 1966, as in Berlin five years earlier, a barrier was built, with mines, vehicle barriers and guard posts. The locals could still observe each other by ascending elevations, but on the east side waving and yelling were prohibited. A female resident was added to a GDR intelligence watch list for answering “likewise” to a West German local who greeted her “happy new year”.

Exhibition Center Establishment

I was told narratives such as these incidents by Robert Lebegern, the head of the institution, who has spent a significant portion of his professional career creating it. Residents were polled early on about how much barrier they wished to keep. They selected a stretch on the western perimeter, adjacent to where one of their own was able to escape in the darkest hours with a scaling tool, subsequently the boundary was heavily strengthened.

Maintained Buildings

2 guard towers are conserved in addition to a series of displays depicting the most impactful moments in the community’s history. As we stroll, the director lists the regulations: no one could come within 5km of the boundary. Agricultural workers needed particular approval to care for their fields; the spouse could operate the combine harvester but under no circumstances the two, lest they tried to flee. Soldiers were on duty.

Larger Perspective

The boundary between West Germany and the East Germany extended 1,400km, from the Baltic coast in the northern part to here in the south. Berlin is remembered and memorialised the greatest, but over double the number people (exceeding 300) lost their lives attempting to traverse it in countryside regions than in the urban center. Robert Lebegern reminds me that 95% of attempts to flee were unsuccessful.

Hamlet Existence

The majority of Mödlareuth’s residents were agricultural workers or skilled workers, who accommodated to residing in the grey zone between a pair of political systems by keeping their heads down and looking after their farms. They did not endorsed the East German authorities nor fought it, Lebegern explains.

Tourism

For sightseers, however, the settlement became a sort of site of interest. Approximately 15,000 came to see annually, binoculars in their hands, to look – and then rapidly depart. In 1983, the American president, George Bush, was guided by the German defence minister.

Twenty-five years after unification, the television series, a television program about a made-up village like Mödlareuth, led to renewed attention.

Present-Day Evolutions

The launch of the modern exhibition center – with a coffee shop, boutique, cinema room and sizable parking lot – is probable to