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An brook so shallow you hardly got your feet wet separated a village for more than four decades of time. Due to a quirk of topography, the 50 inhabitants of Mödlareuth, a tiny settlement bordered by pine forests, pastures and spectacular vistas, found themselves at the center of the Cold War conflict. They had the misfortune to straddle the Bavarian region, in West Germany, and Thuringia in the Eastern part, a boundary that was demarcated first by a enclosure and then by a partition. US troops nicknamed it Mini Berlin.

Commemorating Historical Events

Several months after their own barrier was torn down, and before their country had become one in 1990, a collection of residents started commemorating their heritage. The work is about to come to fruition: on 9 November, the thirty-sixth remembrance of the collapse of the Wall in Berlin, the Deutsch-Deutsches Museum Mödlareuth will inaugurate. It was officially opened by the federal president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in the first part of October, but the display was not completely finished. Speaking to the locals who experienced the old days, Steinmeier remarked: “You were observers of an brutal split, which ripped households apart and turned neighbors into strangers.”

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

Historical Background

Even at its creation in 1810, the village spanned the Kingdom of Bavaria and the Princely State of Reuss, a royal family most renowned for bestowing all its men the title Heinrich and counting them in order by date of birth. As Steinmeier related to the audience, the oddity did not stand in the path of the locals socializing in the identical tavern, visiting the same religious building and sending their children to the same learning center.

Following WWII Division

Subsequently occurred the global conflict. Immediately after they appeared, the Soviet forces installed wood stakes by the stream. For a twelve months they took over the entire community, creating their control center in a dwelling on the Bavarian territory side, adorning it with a portrait of Stalin and a communist symbol. The US forces persuaded them to withdraw to the other side of the brook. For a time, residents could still jump across, though as controls tightened they were forced to show identification, despite the fact that each person was aware who they were, and to go back at evening.

Escalation of Frontier Controls

Subsequently, in 1952, came barbed wire and the formal sealing of the boundary. In 1966, as in Berlin five years earlier, a concrete structure was constructed, with explosives, vehicle barriers and observation points. The residents could still view each other by ascending slopes, but on the Soviet side signaling and calling out were forbidden. One woman was placed on a Stasi monitoring list for replying “likewise” to a western resident who said her “prosperous new year”.

Heritage Site Creation

It was related to me stories including these incidents by Robert Lebegern, the museum’s director, who has devoted a significant portion of his working life developing it. Villagers were asked in the initial phases about how what length of barrier they desired to keep. They selected a section on the west edge, near where a villager succeeded to escape in the darkest hours with a ladder, after which the boundary was substantially reinforced.

Maintained Installations

2 guard towers are conserved together with a collection of tableaux illustrating the most dramatic dates in the community’s chronicle. As we move, Lebergen lists the rules: nobody could come within 5km of the boundary. Rural residents had to obtain special permission to tend to their fields; the husband or wife could use the agricultural equipment but not the two, in case they tried to flee. Military personnel kept guard.

Wider Background

The boundary between the Federal Republic and the GDR stretched 1,400km, from the Baltic Sea in the northern part to here in the southern region. Berlin is commemorated and memorialised the most frequently, but over twice as many individuals (more than 300) were killed attempting to pass over it in provincial zones than in the urban center. Robert Lebegern reminds me that 95% of escape attempts were unsuccessful.

Hamlet Life

Most of Mödlareuth’s villagers were rural laborers or craftsmen, who accommodated to dwelling in the uncertain territory between two belief systems by keeping their heads down and caring for their fields. They did not endorsed the communist regime nor opposed it, Lebegern explains.

Tourism

For visitors, however, the settlement became a sort of destination. Approximately 15,000 visited every year, viewing tools in their hands, to look – and then swiftly depart. In 1983, the US president, George Bush, was guided by the national security head.

25 years after merger, the TV show, a broadcast production about a made-up village similar to Mödlareuth, led to renewed attention.

Present-Day Changes

The inauguration of the modern exhibition center – with a cafe, shop, movie theater and large car park – is expected to