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An brook so shallow you scarcely got your feet wet separated a village for over four decades worth of time. Because of a chance of landscape, the half a hundred residents of Mödlareuth, a tiny settlement bordered by pine forests, fields and breathtaking views, found themselves at the core of the cold war. They had the unfortunate circumstance to straddle the Bavarian region, in Western Germany, and Thuringia in the Soviet sector, a frontier that was demarcated first by a fence and then by a barricade. US troops dubbed it Small Berlin.

Commemorating the Past

Months after their own barrier was breached, and before their nation had become one in 1990, a group of villagers began commemorating their heritage. The project is close to be completed: on 9 November, the thirty-sixth commemoration of the demolition of the Wall in Berlin, the German-German Museum Mödlareuth will begin operations. It was officially inaugurated by the federal president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in the first part of October, but the show was not completely ready. Addressing the locals who lived through the former times, Steinmeier stated: “You were bystanders of an inhuman division, which pulled households apart and turned local residents into foreigners.”

“You were bystanders of an brutal split, which pulled relatives apart and turned local residents into foreigners.”

Past Background

Right from its establishment in 1810, the village spanned the Bavarian Kingdom and the Reuss Principality, a princely house most renowned for giving all its men the name Heinrich and counting them in order by birth. As Steinmeier informed the gathering, the oddity was never an obstacle in the way of the residents drinking in the same tavern, visiting the very same religious building and placing their kids to the same educational institution.

Following WWII Separation

Next arrived the World War II. The moment they came, the Russian troops put up wood stakes by the creek. For a year they took over the entire hamlet, setting up their headquarters in a building on the Bavarian territory side, decorating it with a image of Stalin and a communist symbol. The Americans convinced them to pull back across the creek. For a time, locals could still hop over, though as controls increased they were required to show ID, despite the fact that each person knew who they were, and to come back at night.

Increase of Border Restrictions

Subsequently, in 1952, came barbed wire and the official sealing of the frontier. In 1966, as in Berlin half a decade before, a barrier was built, with landmines, vehicle barriers and watchtowers. The locals could still see each other by climbing slopes, but on the east side signaling and yelling were banned. A female resident was added to a GDR intelligence monitoring list for replying “same to you” to a West German resident who wished her “happy new year”.

Museum Development

I was told stories like these tales by Robert Lebegern, the museum’s director, who has spent a significant portion of his working life building it. Locals were polled at an early stage about how how long a section structure they wished to keep. They selected a section on the western fringe, adjacent to where a villager succeeded to flee in the middle of the night with a ladder, subsequently the frontier was heavily fortified.

Maintained Structures

2 watchtowers are conserved alongside a set of displays illustrating the most significant moments in the village’s chronicle. As we walk, Lebergen lists the regulations: no one could come within 5km of the border. Farmers needed specific authorization to tend to their produce; the partner could work the harvesting machine but never the pair, in case they sought to make a run for it. Military personnel kept guard.

Wider Background

The border between Western Germany and the East Germany extended 1,400 kilometers, from the Baltic Sea in the northern part to the south in the south. Berlin is commemorated and honored the greatest, but more than twice as many people (well over 300) died attempting to traverse it in provincial zones than in the urban center. Lebegern tells me that 95% of escape attempts failed.

Village Life

Most of Mödlareuth’s residents were agricultural workers or craftsmen, who adapted to dwelling in the ambiguous area between a pair of political systems by keeping their heads down and looking after their land. They nor did they endorsed the socialist government nor opposed it, Robert Lebegern explains.

Visitors

For sightseers, however, the settlement became a kind of pilgrimage. About 15,000 came to visit annually, optical devices in possession, to stare – and then quickly leave. In 1983, the United States leader, George Bush, was given a tour by the German defence minister.

25 years after unification, the TV show, a TV series about a imaginary hamlet like Mödlareuth, resulted in fresh interest.

Present-Day Changes

The inauguration of the recently established museum – with a cafe, store, movie theater and sizable parking lot – is expected to