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A creek so narrow you barely got your feet wet divided a community for over four decades. Because of a chance of geography, the half a hundred residents of Mödlareuth, a small village bordered by evergreen groves, fields and stunning views, found themselves at the core of the cold war. They had the misfortune to straddle Bavaria, in the Federal Republic of Germany, and the Thuringian region in the Eastern part, a boundary that was demarcated first by a enclosure and then by a partition. US troops nicknamed it Small Berlin.

Memorialising the Past

A few months after their own barrier was opened, and prior to their country had reunified in 1990, a group of local people started documenting their history. The work is close to come to fruition: on 9 November, the 36th remembrance of the collapse of the Wall in Berlin, the Deutsch-Deutsches Museum Mödlareuth will begin operations. It was publicly launched by the federal president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in early October, but the exhibition was not completely finished. Speaking to the villagers who experienced the old days, Steinmeier said: “You were bystanders of an brutal split, which ripped relatives apart and turned neighbors into aliens.”

“You were observers of an inhuman separation, which pulled households apart and turned neighbors into foreigners.”

Bygone Background

Right from its establishment in 1810, the village straddled the Royal Bavaria and the Princely State of Reuss, a royal family most famous for giving all its men the title Heinrich and counting them sequentially by birth. As Steinmeier related to the audience, the quirk never stood in the path of the locals gathering in the identical pub, visiting the very same religious building and enrolling their kids to the same school.

Following WWII Split

Next arrived the second world war. The moment they came, the Russians put up wood stakes by the brook. For a twelve months they seized the whole village, creating their command in a house on the Bavarian side, decorating it with a image of Stalin and a communist symbol. The American soldiers urged them to retreat to the other side of the creek. For a period, villagers could still hop over, though as restrictions became stricter they were required to display identity papers, despite the fact that each person was aware who they were, and to go back at after dark.

Increase of Frontier Controls

Subsequently, in 1952, came wire fencing and the official closing of the boundary. In 1966, as in Berlin previously in 1961, a barrier was built, with landmines, tank traps and guard posts. The locals could still see each other by ascending slopes, but on the eastern side gesturing and calling out were prohibited. A local woman was put on a East German secret police surveillance list for answering “back at you” to a West German local who said her “happy new year”.

Museum Creation

I heard narratives including these incidents by Robert Lebegern, the head of the institution, who has spent a significant portion of his occupational time building it. Locals were asked in the initial phases about how what length of wall they desired to keep. They chose a section on the Bavarian perimeter, near where a local resident succeeded to flee in the dead of night with a scaling tool, subsequently the boundary was heavily fortified.

Preserved Structures

A pair of observation towers are maintained alongside a set of exhibits showing the most dramatic moments in the hamlet’s history. As we move, Robert Lebegern details the restrictions: no one could approach 5km of the border. Farmers needed particular approval to care for their crops; the partner could operate the combine harvester but not the two, in case they sought to escape. Military personnel kept guard.

Wider Context

The border between West Germany and the German Democratic Republic stretched 1,400km, from the northern sea in the northern part to here in the south. Berlin is remembered and documented the most, but more than two times more persons (well over 300) died seeking to pass over it in rural areas than in the urban center. Robert Lebegern reminds me that almost all of escape attempts failed.

Hamlet Daily Living

Most of Mödlareuth’s residents were agricultural workers or craftsmen, who adapted to dwelling in the ambiguous area between a pair of belief systems by avoiding attention and caring for their fields. They did not endorsed the socialist government nor opposed it, the director states.

Visitors

For tourists, however, the village became a sort of site of interest. About fifteen thousand came to see each year, viewing tools in their hands, to stare – and then rapidly leave. In 1983, the United States leader, George Bush, was shown around by the national security head.

25 years after reunification, the television series, a TV series about a imaginary community similar to Mödlareuth, caused fresh curiosity.

Modern Developments

The launch of the new museum – with a cafe, shop, movie theater and large car park – is likely to