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An stream so shallow you scarcely got your feet wet divided a village for more than four decades worth of time. Because of a chance of landscape, the fifty residents of Mödlareuth, a hamlet surrounded by evergreen groves, pastures and stunning vistas, found themselves at the heart of the Cold War conflict. They had the bad luck to straddle Bavaria, in Western Germany, and Thuringia in the Eastern part, a border that was established first by a enclosure and then by a partition. American soldiers called it Mini Berlin.

Preserving History

A few months after their own barrier was opened, and prior to their nation had unified again in 1990, a assembly of local people set about commemorating their history. The work is about to reach completion: on 9 November, the thirty-sixth anniversary of the collapse of the German barrier, the German-German Museum Mödlareuth will inaugurate. It was formally inaugurated by the federal president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in early October, but the exhibition was not entirely finished. Speaking to the villagers who endured the past era, Steinmeier said: “You were witnesses of an inhuman division, which ripped households apart and turned neighbours into aliens.”

“You were observers of an cruel separation, which ripped families into pieces and turned neighbors into foreigners.”

Historical Origins

Starting at its establishment in 1810, the hamlet straddled the Bavarian Kingdom and the Reuss Principality, a princely house most renowned for giving all its men the title Heinrich and counting them in order by birth. As Steinmeier told the crowd, the quirk was never an obstacle in the manner of the residents drinking in the identical inn, visiting the same place of worship and enrolling their young ones to the very same educational institution.

After the War Division

Subsequently occurred the World War II. Immediately after they appeared, the Russian troops put up timber poles by the creek. For a year they seized the entire community, creating their headquarters in a dwelling on the Bavarian side, adorning it with a portrait of Stalin and a Soviet emblem. The American soldiers convinced them to withdraw to the other side of the creek. For a time, villagers could continue to cross over, though as controls tightened they were forced to present identity papers, even though everyone understood who they were, and to return at night.

Escalation of Frontier Measures

Subsequently, in 1952, came barbed wire and the legal sealing of the boundary. In 1966, as in Berlin half a decade before, a wall was built, with landmines, tank traps and watchtowers. The residents could continue to observe each other by scaling slopes, but on the eastern side signaling and yelling were prohibited. One woman was added to a East German secret police monitoring list for replying “same to you” to a western local who wished her “good new year”.

Museum Development

I was told stories like these tales by Robert Lebegern, the head of the institution, who has devoted much of his working life creating it. Locals were consulted in the initial phases about how much wall they wished to preserve. They selected a section on the Bavarian perimeter, close to where one of their own managed to flee in the dead of night with a climbing device, subsequently the border was heavily fortified.

Preserved Buildings

Two observation towers are preserved alongside a series of displays illustrating the most impactful events in the community’s chronicle. As we walk, Lebergen lists the regulations: no one could approach 5km of the boundary. Rural residents needed particular approval to look after their produce; the partner could operate the harvesting machine but never the two, for fear that they sought to escape. Soldiers stood watch.

Larger Perspective

The border between Western Germany and the German Democratic Republic extended 1,400km, from the northern sea in the northern part to this location in the south. Berlin is commemorated and honored the greatest, but in excess of twice as many people (well over 300) were killed trying to pass over it in rural areas than in the big city. the director reminds me that almost all of efforts to cross did not succeed.

Village Daily Living

The greater part of Mödlareuth’s villagers were agricultural workers or artisans, who accommodated to residing in the uncertain territory between a pair of belief systems by keeping their heads down and tending to their farms. They neither supported the East German authorities nor resisted it, Lebegern clarifies.

Interest

For tourists, however, the hamlet became a type of site of interest. About 15,000 came to see every year, optical devices in their hands, to gawp – and then quickly leave. In 1983, the American president, George Bush, was shown around by the German defence minister.

25 years after unification, the TV show, a TV series about a imaginary hamlet resembling Mödlareuth, caused renewed attention.

Present-Day Changes

The inauguration of the modern exhibition center – with a cafe, store, film screening area and large vehicle area – is likely to