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A creek so low you barely got your ankles wet split a community for more than four decades worth of time. Due to a quirk of geography, the half a hundred locals of Mödlareuth, a hamlet bordered by pine forests, meadows and stunning views, found themselves at the center of the Cold War tensions. They had the misfortune to cross the Bavarian region, in West Germany, and the Thuringian region in the East, a border that was marked first by a barrier and then by a partition. United States military personnel dubbed it Mini Berlin.

Preserving History

Months after their own wall was torn down, and prior to their nation had become one in 1990, a group of villagers started documenting their past. The effort is close to come to fruition: on 9 November, the 36th annual commemoration of the fall of the Wall in Berlin, the Museum of German Division Mödlareuth will open. It was officially launched by the federal president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in the beginning of October, but the show wasn’t quite prepared. Addressing the locals who endured the former times, Steinmeier remarked: “You were witnesses of an cruel division, which pulled families apart and turned neighbours into foreigners.”

“You were witnesses of an cruel division, which pulled families asunder and turned local residents into strangers.”

Historical Background

Right from its creation in 1810, the community straddled the Royal Bavaria and the Principality of Reuss, a princely house most famous for giving all its male members the name Heinrich and labeling them sequentially by birth order. As Steinmeier related to the audience, the peculiarity never stood in the manner of the residents socializing in the very same tavern, visiting the identical church and sending their young ones to the same educational institution.

Following WWII Separation

Then came the World War II. As soon as they came, the Soviet forces installed wood stakes by the stream. For a annual period they seized the whole village, setting up their headquarters in a dwelling on the western side, embellishing it with a image of Stalin and a red star. The Americans persuaded them to retreat across the stream. For a while, villagers could still jump across, though as controls tightened they were obliged to show ID, although each person knew who they were, and to come back at night.

Escalation of Frontier Measures

After that, in 1952, came metal barriers and the legal closing of the border. In 1966, as in Berlin previously in 1961, a wall was built, with landmines, tank traps and guard posts. The locals could continue to observe each other by ascending elevations, but on the Soviet side gesturing and calling out were banned. A local woman was added to a GDR intelligence surveillance list for answering “same to you” to a western local who greeted her “happy new year”.

Museum Establishment

I heard stories such as these by Robert Lebegern, the head of the institution, who has dedicated much of his professional career developing it. Locals were polled in the initial phases about how much structure they desired to preserve. They selected a section on the west fringe, near where a villager managed to escape in the dead of night with a scaling tool, following which the frontier was substantially reinforced.

Preserved Buildings

A pair of observation towers are preserved in addition to a set of exhibits depicting the most impactful events in the village’s history. As we stroll, Robert Lebegern details the rules: not a single person could get closer than 5km of the border. Farmers required specific authorization to care for their crops; the partner could operate the agricultural equipment but never the pair, for fear that they sought to make a run for it. Soldiers were on duty.

Broader Perspective

The border between West Germany and the GDR extended nearly 900 miles, from the Baltic Sea in the northern part to here in the south. Berlin is recalled and honored the most frequently, but over two times more people (well over 300) lost their lives attempting to pass over it in rural areas than in the urban center. Lebegern tells me that 95% of efforts to cross did not succeed.

Hamlet Daily Living

Most of Mödlareuth’s residents were rural laborers or skilled workers, who adjusted to living in the uncertain territory between two belief systems by avoiding attention and looking after their land. They did not supported the socialist government nor opposed it, Lebegern clarifies.

Visitors

For visitors, however, the hamlet became a kind of destination. About 15,000 visited each year, viewing tools in their hands, to stare – and then rapidly go away. In 1983, the US president, George Bush, was guided by the German defence minister.

Twenty-five years after unification, the television series, a broadcast production about a made-up hamlet like Mödlareuth, led to new attention.

Current Developments

The opening of the recently established museum – with a cafe, store, film screening area and big car park – is likely to