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A brook so narrow you scarcely got your ankles wet divided a settlement for in excess of four decades worth of time. By an accident of landscape, the fifty inhabitants of Mödlareuth, a tiny settlement surrounded by coniferous woods, pastures and breathtaking scenery, found themselves at the center of the Cold War tensions. They had the unfortunate circumstance to span the Bavarian region, in West Germany, and the Thuringian region in the Eastern part, a boundary that was demarcated first by a fence and then by a partition. American soldiers called it Small Berlin.

Commemorating the Past

Several months after their own wall was breached, and prior to their nation had become one in 1990, a collection of villagers began documenting their history. The work is close to reach completion: on 9 November, the thirty-sixth remembrance of the collapse of the Berlin Wall, the German-German Museum Mödlareuth will open. It was officially launched by the national president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in the beginning of October, but the display was not completely finished. Addressing the locals who experienced the past era, Steinmeier said: “You were bystanders of an brutal split, which tore families into pieces and turned neighbors into strangers.”

“You were witnesses of an brutal division, which tore relatives into pieces and turned neighbors into aliens.”

Bygone Context

Starting at its founding in 1810, the hamlet cut across the Royal Bavaria and the Princely State of Reuss, a noble lineage most renowned for assigning all its male members the designation Heinrich and counting them in order by date of birth. As Steinmeier informed the audience, the peculiarity was never an obstacle in the manner of the residents drinking in the identical pub, going to the identical place of worship and placing their young ones to the very same school.

After the War Separation

Next arrived the World War II. The moment they appeared, the Soviet forces installed timber poles by the brook. For a year they seized the entire community, setting up their headquarters in a building on the Bavarian territory side, embellishing it with a portrait of Stalin and a red star. The Americans convinced them to pull back back over the stream. For a time, locals could still hop over, though as restrictions became stricter they were obliged to show identity papers, even though all was aware who they were, and to come back at night.

Increase of Frontier Measures

Subsequently, in 1952, came metal barriers and the official closing of the border. In 1966, as in Berlin half a decade before, a barrier was erected, with mines, tank traps and watchtowers. The villagers could still observe each other by scaling hills, but on the eastern side signaling and shouting were banned. A local woman was put on a East German secret police surveillance list for responding “same to you” to a West German resident who greeted her “happy new year”.

Museum Development

It was related to me stories such as these tales by Robert Lebegern, the director of the museum, who has spent a large part of his professional career building it. Residents were asked early on about how much structure they wanted to maintain. They chose a stretch on the west edge, near where one of their own was able to flee in the dead of night with a scaling tool, after which the boundary was substantially strengthened.

Conserved Installations

A pair of watchtowers are preserved alongside a series of tableaux illustrating the most impactful events in the hamlet’s past. As we move, Robert Lebegern details the regulations: nobody could come within 5km of the frontier. Rural residents had to obtain particular approval to tend to their fields; the spouse could use the harvesting machine but under no circumstances the two, for fear that they tried to flee. Military personnel kept guard.

Broader Context

The boundary between Western Germany and the German Democratic Republic stretched nearly 900 miles, from the northern sea in the north to here in the southern region. Berlin is recalled and memorialised the most, but in excess of twice as many persons (well over 300) died trying to cross it in provincial zones than in the metropolis. Robert Lebegern tells me that 95% of efforts to cross failed.

Community Life

The majority of Mödlareuth’s residents were rural laborers or skilled workers, who adapted to dwelling in the uncertain territory between two ideological spheres by keeping their heads down and caring for their fields. They nor did they supported the communist regime nor fought it, Robert Lebegern explains.

Interest

For sightseers, however, the hamlet became a sort of destination. Roughly 15,000 came to see annually, viewing tools in hand, to gawp – and then swiftly go away. In 1983, the US president, George Bush, was given a tour by the German defence minister.

25 years after merger, the television series, a broadcast production about a imaginary village similar to Mödlareuth, resulted in fresh interest.

Present-Day Changes

The launch of the new museum – with a restaurant, store, film screening area and sizable car park – is likely to