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An stream so shallow you hardly got your ankles wet split a village for more than four decades worth of time. By an accident of geography, the 50 residents of Mödlareuth, a hamlet encircled by evergreen groves, meadows and stunning vistas, found themselves at the heart of the cold war. They had the bad luck to straddle Bavaria, in West Germany, and Thuringia in the Soviet sector, a boundary that was demarcated first by a barrier and then by a wall. United States military personnel called it Mini Berlin.

Memorialising the Past

A few months after their own division was breached, and prior to their nation had unified again in 1990, a group of residents set about memorialising their heritage. The work is soon to be completed: on 9 November, the 36th annual anniversary of the fall of the Wall in Berlin, the Museum of German Division Mödlareuth will open. It was formally launched by the head of state, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in the first part of October, but the exhibition was not entirely prepared. Telling the residents who experienced the old days, Steinmeier said: “You were bystanders of an cruel separation, which ripped relatives asunder and turned neighbors into aliens.”

“You were bystanders of an inhuman separation, which tore relatives apart and turned local residents into strangers.”

Bygone Background

Even at its establishment in 1810, the hamlet cut across the Royal Bavaria and the Principality of Reuss, a royal family best known for assigning all its men the title Heinrich and numbering them consecutively by date of birth. As Steinmeier related to the crowd, the peculiarity was never an obstacle in the manner of the residents drinking in the very same tavern, visiting the same religious building and sending their kids to the very same educational institution.

Following WWII Separation

Subsequently occurred the World War II. As soon as they arrived, the Russians erected timber poles by the creek. For a year they occupied the whole hamlet, establishing their headquarters in a dwelling on the Bavarian territory side, adorning it with a image of Stalin and a communist symbol. The US forces persuaded them to retreat to the other side of the brook. For a period, residents could still jump across, though as restrictions increased they were forced to display ID, even though each person knew who they were, and to come back at after dark.

Increase of Frontier Restrictions

Subsequently, in 1952, came wire fencing and the official shutting of the frontier. In 1966, as in Berlin previously in 1961, a barrier was erected, with landmines, anti-tank obstacles and observation points. The villagers could still see each other by ascending elevations, but on the east side waving and yelling were banned. One woman was put on a GDR intelligence surveillance list for responding “likewise” to a Bavarian local who said her “prosperous new year”.

Heritage Site Creation

It was related to me narratives like these incidents by Robert Lebegern, the director of the museum, who has dedicated a significant portion of his occupational time creating it. Locals were polled at an early stage about how much structure they wanted to maintain. They selected a portion on the Bavarian fringe, near where a villager was able to flee in the darkest hours with a ladder, subsequently the frontier was significantly fortified.

Maintained Buildings

A pair of observation towers are maintained alongside a set of exhibits illustrating the most dramatic dates in the hamlet’s chronicle. As we move, Lebergen lists the regulations: nobody could get closer than 5km of the frontier. Rural residents required particular approval to tend to their produce; the partner could work the combine harvester but not the pair, for fear that they sought to flee. Military personnel stood watch.

Larger Context

The frontier between Western Germany and the German Democratic Republic ran nearly 900 miles, from the northern sea in the northern part to this location in the south. Berlin is remembered and documented the most, but more than twice as many persons (exceeding 300) were killed seeking to pass over it in provincial zones than in the big city. Lebegern reminds me that 95% of attempts to flee failed.

Village Existence

The majority of Mödlareuth’s locals were rural laborers or skilled workers, who accommodated to residing in the ambiguous area between two ideological spheres by staying low-profile and tending to their land. They did not backed the communist regime nor opposed it, Lebegern states.

Interest

For sightseers, however, the village became a type of destination. Approximately 15k came to visit annually, optical devices in possession, to gawp – and then rapidly depart. In 1983, the United States leader, George Bush, was guided by the German defense official.

Twenty-five years after reunification, the TV show, a TV series about a fictional hamlet resembling Mödlareuth, resulted in renewed interest.

Current Evolutions

The opening of the modern exhibition center – with a cafe, shop, film screening area and sizable car park – is expected to