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An brook so narrow you barely got your feet wet split a settlement for in excess of four decades. By an accident of landscape, the half a hundred inhabitants of Mödlareuth, a small village surrounded by pine forests, pastures and stunning scenery, found themselves at the center of the Cold War tensions. They had the misfortune to span the Bavarian region, in West Germany, and Thuringia in the East, a boundary that was demarcated first by a fence and then by a wall. US troops dubbed it Mini Berlin.

Commemorating History

Months after their own wall was opened, and prior to their state had reunified in 1990, a collection of local people set about memorialising their past. The work is about to come to fruition: on 9 November, the 36th commemoration of the fall of the Wall in Berlin, the Deutsch-Deutsches Museum Mödlareuth will inaugurate. It was officially opened by the head of state, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in the beginning of October, but the exhibition wasn’t quite prepared. Telling the locals who lived through the former times, Steinmeier said: “You were bystanders of an cruel split, which ripped households apart and turned local residents into aliens.”

“You were observers of an cruel split, which pulled relatives asunder and turned local residents into strangers.”

Bygone Background

Starting at its founding in 1810, the hamlet cut across the Bavarian Kingdom and the Principality of Reuss, a princely house most famous for giving all its male members the name Heinrich and labeling them consecutively by birth order. As Steinmeier told the audience, the oddity never stood in the path of the inhabitants drinking in the identical inn, attending the same religious building and enrolling their young ones to the same educational institution.

Following WWII Split

Next arrived the World War II. Immediately after they appeared, the Soviet forces erected wood stakes by the brook. For a twelve months they occupied the entire village, creating their command in a house on the Bavarian territory side, decorating it with a portrait of Stalin and a communist symbol. The Americans urged them to withdraw across the brook. For a period, villagers could still hop over, though as controls became stricter they were forced to display identification, despite the fact that everyone was aware who they were, and to come back at night.

Intensification of Boundary Restrictions

Subsequently, in 1952, came metal barriers and the legal closing of the border. In 1966, as in Berlin previously in 1961, a barrier was erected, with explosives, vehicle barriers and observation points. The residents could still view each other by climbing slopes, but on the east side gesturing and yelling were banned. A local woman was put on a GDR intelligence watch list for replying “same to you” to a western resident who greeted her “happy new year”.

Museum Establishment

I heard accounts such as these by Robert Lebegern, the head of the institution, who has spent a significant portion of his professional career creating it. Locals were consulted in the initial phases about how how long a section wall they wished to preserve. They opted for a portion on the west edge, adjacent to where one of their own was able to get away in the middle of the night with a climbing device, following which the border was significantly strengthened.

Maintained Installations

Two guard towers are conserved together with a set of exhibits showing the most significant moments in the community’s past. As we move, Lebergen lists the regulations: not a single person could come within 5km of the border. Farmers had to obtain specific authorization to look after their produce; the husband or wife could use the agricultural equipment but not the two, for fear that they sought to flee. Soldiers kept guard.

Larger Background

The border between Western Germany and the GDR ran 1,400km, from the Baltic coast in the northern part to this location in the southern region. Berlin is recalled and documented the most, but over two times more persons (exceeding 300) died attempting to cross it in rural areas than in the big city. the director informs me that almost all of efforts to cross failed.

Hamlet Life

Most of Mödlareuth’s residents were agricultural workers or craftsmen, who adapted to residing in the ambiguous area between a pair of belief systems by avoiding attention and tending to their land. They did not supported the East German authorities nor resisted it, the director explains.

Visitors

For visitors, however, the hamlet became a sort of pilgrimage. Roughly fifteen thousand came to see every year, optical devices in hand, to stare – and then swiftly leave. In 1983, the American president, George Bush, was shown around by the German defence minister.

Twenty-five years after reunification, the television series, a TV series about a fictional hamlet similar to Mödlareuth, led to renewed attention.

Modern Changes

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