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A creek so shallow you scarcely got your ankles wet split a village for in excess of four decades of time. By an accident of geography, the 50 inhabitants of Mödlareuth, a tiny settlement surrounded by evergreen groves, fields and spectacular vistas, found themselves at the center of the cold war. They had the misfortune to cross the Bavarian region, in West Germany, and Thuringia in the East, a frontier that was established first by a fence and then by a barricade. US troops called it Small Berlin.

Memorialising Historical Events

Months after their own barrier was torn down, and even before their nation had become one in 1990, a assembly of residents began memorialising their history. The effort is close to reach completion: on 9 November, the 36th annual commemoration of the collapse of the Berlin Wall, the Museum of German Division Mödlareuth will open. It was officially inaugurated by the head of state, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in the beginning of October, but the display was not completely prepared. Addressing the villagers who endured the old days, Steinmeier stated: “You were bystanders of an cruel division, which ripped families into pieces and turned local residents into aliens.”

“You were bystanders of an inhuman division, which tore households into pieces and turned local residents into aliens.”

Bygone Background

Starting at its creation in 1810, the community straddled the Royal Bavaria and the Reuss Principality, a noble lineage most renowned for assigning all its male members the designation Heinrich and labeling them sequentially by birth order. As Steinmeier informed the crowd, the oddity was never an obstacle in the manner of the locals socializing in the very same inn, visiting the same religious building and enrolling their young ones to the same learning center.

Following WWII Separation

Then came the World War II. Immediately after they came, the Soviet forces erected wooden posts by the creek. For a annual period they occupied the entire community, creating their command in a house on the western side, embellishing it with a picture of Stalin and a Soviet emblem. The US forces urged them to retreat back over the stream. For a time, residents could still jump across, though as controls tightened they were required to show ID, despite the fact that all knew who they were, and to come back at evening.

Intensification of Boundary Measures

After that, in 1952, came barbed wire and the legal sealing of the frontier. In 1966, as in Berlin previously in 1961, a wall was constructed, with explosives, tank traps and watchtowers. The locals could continue to see each other by climbing slopes, but on the eastern side signaling and yelling were forbidden. A female resident was placed on a GDR intelligence surveillance list for replying “back at you” to a western villager who wished her “prosperous new year”.

Exhibition Center Establishment

It was related to me stories such as these by Robert Lebegern, the museum’s director, who has dedicated a large part of his occupational time developing it. Residents were asked at an early stage about how much wall they wished to maintain. They selected a section on the west edge, close to where a local resident managed to get away in the middle of the night with a ladder, following which the frontier was significantly reinforced.

Preserved Buildings

2 guard towers are maintained together with a collection of tableaux showing the most dramatic moments in the community’s past. As we walk, Robert Lebegern details the restrictions: no one could get closer than 5km of the border. Farmers had to obtain particular approval to look after their fields; the spouse could operate the combine harvester but never the pair, in case they tried to escape. Armed guards stood watch.

Larger Background

The border between the Federal Republic and the German Democratic Republic extended 1,400km, from the Baltic coast in the north to here in the southern region. Berlin is remembered and documented the greatest, but in excess of twice as many persons (well over 300) died trying to pass over it in provincial zones than in the urban center. the director informs me that almost all of attempts to flee were unsuccessful.

Village Daily Living

The greater part of Mödlareuth’s residents were rural laborers or artisans, who adapted to living in the uncertain territory between a pair of belief systems by keeping their heads down and caring for their fields. They neither supported the East German authorities nor opposed it, the director clarifies.

Tourism

For sightseers, however, the hamlet became a type of pilgrimage. Approximately 15k came to visit each year, binoculars in hand, to look – and then swiftly leave. In 1983, the US president, George Bush, was guided by the German defense official.

25 years after unification, the television series, a broadcast production about a made-up community resembling Mödlareuth, caused renewed attention.

Current Evolutions

The launch of the new museum – with a cafe, shop, film screening area and big car park – is expected to