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An brook so narrow you hardly got your ankles wet divided a settlement for more than four decades. By an accident of topography, the fifty residents of Mödlareuth, a tiny settlement surrounded by evergreen groves, meadows and spectacular vistas, found themselves at the center of the Cold War conflict. They had the unfortunate circumstance to straddle the Bavarian region, in Western Germany, and Thuringia in the East, a border that was established first by a enclosure and then by a barricade. United States military personnel dubbed it Mini Berlin.

Commemorating the Past

Months after their own wall was torn down, and prior to their nation had unified again in 1990, a collection of villagers set about documenting their heritage. The work is soon to be completed: on 9 November, the 36th anniversary of the collapse of the Berlin Wall, the Deutsch-Deutsches Museum Mödlareuth will open. It was formally opened by the national president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in early October, but the display was not entirely ready. Telling the villagers who experienced the old days, Steinmeier stated: “You were bystanders of an inhuman division, which ripped families apart and turned neighbors into foreigners.”

“You were bystanders of an brutal division, which ripped families asunder and turned neighbors into foreigners.”

Historical Background

Even at its establishment in 1810, the hamlet cut across the Kingdom of Bavaria and the Princely State of Reuss, a princely house most renowned for assigning all its male members the title Heinrich and numbering them sequentially by birth order. As Steinmeier told the crowd, the quirk was never an obstacle in the path of the residents drinking in the very same pub, visiting the same religious building and enrolling their kids to the very same educational institution.

Post-War Division

Then came the World War II. As soon as they arrived, the Russians installed wood stakes by the stream. For a year they seized the entire village, setting up their control center in a building on the western side, embellishing it with a image of Stalin and a red star. The American soldiers urged them to withdraw across the brook. For a period, locals could continue to jump across, though as controls increased they were obliged to show identification, although everyone understood who they were, and to come back at night.

Increase of Border Controls

After that, 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 mines, anti-tank obstacles and guard posts. The residents could still view each other by ascending hills, but on the east side gesturing and calling out were forbidden. A local woman was added to a East German secret police watch list for responding “same to you” to a western local who wished her “happy new year”.

Heritage Site Establishment

I was told accounts including these tales by Robert Lebegern, the director of the museum, who has devoted much of his working life developing it. Villagers were polled in the initial phases about how how long a section barrier they desired to keep. They chose a section on the western fringe, adjacent to where a local resident managed to flee in the darkest hours with a climbing device, subsequently the boundary was heavily fortified.

Preserved Buildings

2 watchtowers are conserved together with a series of displays depicting the most dramatic moments in the hamlet’s history. As we move, Lebergen lists the rules: nobody could get closer than 5km of the frontier. Rural residents had to obtain specific authorization to look after their crops; the spouse could use the combine harvester but never both, lest they tried to flee. Armed guards stood watch.

Broader Perspective

The border between Western Germany and the East Germany ran nearly 900 miles, from the Baltic Sea in the north to the south in the south. Berlin is remembered and documented the most frequently, but in excess of double the number people (exceeding 300) were killed trying to pass over it in provincial zones than in the urban center. Robert Lebegern tells me that 95% of attempts to flee did not succeed.

Community Life

The majority of Mödlareuth’s residents were rural laborers or artisans, who adjusted to residing in the uncertain territory between 2 political systems by staying low-profile and tending to their land. They nor did they endorsed the socialist government nor fought it, Robert Lebegern states.

Interest

For visitors, however, the settlement became a kind of destination. Roughly 15k visited annually, viewing tools in possession, to gawp – and then quickly depart. In 1983, the US president, George Bush, was guided by the national security head.

Twenty five years after unification, the television series, a TV series about a imaginary hamlet similar to Mödlareuth, resulted in new curiosity.

Present-Day Developments

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