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A creek so narrow you barely got your ankles wet separated a village for more than four decades of time. By an accident of topography, the 50 locals of Mödlareuth, a small village surrounded by evergreen groves, fields and breathtaking views, found themselves at the center of the cold war. They had the misfortune to straddle the Bavarian region, in West Germany, and the Thuringian region in the Soviet sector, a border that was marked first by a enclosure and then by a partition. United States military personnel nicknamed it Small Berlin.

Preserving the Past

Several months after their own division was torn down, and even before their nation had reunified in 1990, a assembly of local people began documenting their heritage. The project is about to be completed: on 9 November, the 36th anniversary of the demolition of the Berlin Wall, the Deutsch-Deutsches Museum Mödlareuth will begin operations. It was publicly opened by the national president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in the first part of October, but the display wasn’t quite ready. Speaking to the villagers who endured the former times, Steinmeier stated: “You were witnesses of an inhuman separation, which ripped families apart and turned neighbors into foreigners.”

“You were bystanders of an cruel separation, which ripped households into pieces and turned neighbours into strangers.”

Historical Background

Right from its establishment in 1810, the community cut across the Royal Bavaria and the Reuss Principality, a royal family most renowned for giving all its male descendants the designation Heinrich and counting them in order by date of birth. As Steinmeier related to the crowd, the quirk was never an obstacle in the manner of the inhabitants drinking in the very same inn, attending the very same place of worship and enrolling their young ones to the very same school.

After the War Division

Subsequently occurred the second world war. As soon as they arrived, the Soviet forces erected wood stakes by the brook. For a year they seized the complete village, creating their headquarters in a house on the Bavarian territory side, adorning it with a image of Stalin and a Soviet emblem. The US forces urged them to withdraw to the other side of the stream. For a time, residents could still cross over, though as restrictions became stricter they were required to display identification, even though each person understood who they were, and to go back at evening.

Intensification of Frontier Controls

After that, in 1952, came barbed wire and the formal closing of the border. In 1966, as in Berlin five years earlier, a barrier was erected, with mines, anti-tank obstacles and watchtowers. The residents could continue to view each other by ascending hills, but on the east side waving and calling out were forbidden. A local woman was added to a GDR intelligence surveillance list for replying “same to you” to a Bavarian local who greeted her “happy new year”.

Museum Establishment

It was related to me narratives including these by Robert Lebegern, the museum’s director, who has dedicated much of his occupational time building it. Locals were polled in the initial phases about how how long a section wall they wanted to keep. They chose a stretch on the western edge, near where a local resident was able to escape in the dead of night with a scaling tool, subsequently the border was substantially reinforced.

Conserved Buildings

Two watchtowers are preserved in addition to a collection of tableaux depicting the most significant dates in the hamlet’s history. As we stroll, Lebergen details the rules: not a single person could get closer than 5km of the boundary. Rural residents had to obtain specific authorization to look after their crops; the partner could use the combine harvester but never both, lest they sought to flee. Armed guards were on duty.

Larger Context

The frontier between the Federal Republic and the German Democratic Republic extended nearly 900 miles, from the Baltic coast in the north to the south in the south. Berlin is recalled and documented the greatest, but more than two times more people (well over 300) were killed seeking to cross it in countryside regions than in the metropolis. Lebegern reminds me that 95% of efforts to cross were unsuccessful.

Hamlet Daily Living

The majority of Mödlareuth’s villagers were farmers or skilled workers, who adapted to dwelling in the grey zone between a pair of belief systems by avoiding attention and caring for their land. They nor did they endorsed the East German authorities nor resisted it, Lebegern states.

Interest

For visitors, however, the hamlet became a type of pilgrimage. Approximately 15,000 visited each year, optical devices in hand, to gawp – and then swiftly leave. In 1983, the US president, George Bush, was shown around by the national security head.

Twenty five years after reunification, Tannbach, a television program about a fictional community like Mödlareuth, caused new curiosity.

Current Changes

The inauguration of the recently established museum – with a cafe, shop, film screening area and large parking lot – is expected to