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An stream so narrow you barely got your feet wet divided a settlement for in excess of four decades. By an accident of topography, the half a hundred locals of Mödlareuth, a hamlet encircled by pine forests, fields and breathtaking scenery, found themselves at the core of the Cold War conflict. They had the unfortunate circumstance to straddle the Bavarian region, in the Federal Republic of Germany, and the Thuringian region in the Eastern part, a boundary that was demarcated first by a fence and then by a wall. US troops called it Mini Berlin.

Preserving the Past

Several months after their own barrier was torn down, and before their nation had reunified in 1990, a collection of residents set about documenting their history. The work is soon to come to fruition: on 9 November, the 36th remembrance of the fall of the German barrier, the Museum of German Division Mödlareuth will inaugurate. It was formally inaugurated by the federal president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in the beginning of October, but the exhibition was not completely prepared. Speaking to the residents who lived through the past era, Steinmeier remarked: “You were observers of an inhuman split, which ripped families apart and turned neighbors into aliens.”

“You were witnesses of an cruel division, which tore households asunder and turned neighbors into strangers.”

Bygone Origins

Even at its establishment in 1810, the village spanned the Royal Bavaria and the Princely State 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 related to the audience, the oddity never stood in the manner of the inhabitants drinking in the very same inn, going to the very same religious building and sending their young ones to the same learning center.

Post-War Division

Then came the global conflict. The moment they came, the Soviet forces installed timber poles by the brook. For a year they seized the complete village, establishing their control center in a dwelling on the Bavarian territory side, adorning it with a image of Stalin and a red star. The Americans convinced them to pull back to the other side of the brook. For a period, villagers could still cross over, though as controls increased they were forced to present identity papers, even though everyone knew who they were, and to go back at night.

Increase of Border Controls

After that, in 1952, came wire fencing and the legal shutting of the border. In 1966, as in Berlin five years earlier, a barrier was built, with explosives, tank traps and watchtowers. The locals could still observe each other by ascending slopes, but on the east side waving and yelling were banned. One woman was added to a GDR intelligence monitoring list for answering “likewise” to a western local who wished her “prosperous new year”.

Exhibition Center Creation

I heard narratives such as these incidents by Robert Lebegern, the head of the institution, who has dedicated a large part of his occupational time developing it. Villagers were asked in the initial phases about how what length of wall they wanted to maintain. They opted for a stretch on the western edge, near where a villager was able to flee in the middle of the night with a scaling tool, following which the border was substantially fortified.

Preserved Installations

A pair of watchtowers are conserved alongside a collection of displays showing the most impactful dates in the community’s chronicle. As we stroll, Lebergen enumerates the restrictions: no one could approach 5km of the frontier. Farmers needed specific authorization to look after their fields; the husband or wife could operate the agricultural equipment but not both, lest they attempted to escape. Soldiers kept guard.

Broader Context

The frontier between the Federal Republic and the German Democratic Republic extended 1,400km, from the Baltic Sea in the northern part to the south in the south. Berlin is commemorated and documented the most, but over two times more individuals (well over 300) were killed trying to traverse it in rural areas than in the big city. Lebegern tells me that 95% of attempts to flee were unsuccessful.

Hamlet Life

The majority of Mödlareuth’s residents were agricultural workers or artisans, who adjusted to living in the ambiguous area between 2 political systems by avoiding attention and tending to their fields. They nor did they supported the communist regime nor resisted it, Lebegern clarifies.

Visitors

For visitors, however, the village became a kind of destination. About 15,000 came to see each year, binoculars in possession, to look – and then rapidly depart. In 1983, the American president, George Bush, was guided by the German defense official.

Twenty-five years after unification, the television series, a television program about a fictional community similar to Mödlareuth, resulted in fresh attention.

Current Evolutions

The opening of the new museum – with a restaurant, shop, film screening area and sizable parking lot – is probable to