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An creek so narrow you barely got your feet wet separated a settlement for over four decades worth of time. Due to a quirk of landscape, the 50 locals of Mödlareuth, a small village encircled by evergreen groves, meadows and stunning vistas, found themselves at the center of the cold war. They had the bad luck to straddle Bavaria, in Western Germany, and Thuringia in the Eastern part, a border that was marked first by a fence and then by a wall. US troops called it Little Berlin.

Preserving History

Months after their own barrier was torn down, and prior to their nation had unified again in 1990, a assembly of residents began commemorating their heritage. The effort is soon to reach completion: on 9 November, the 36th anniversary of the collapse of the Berlin Wall, the Museum of German Division Mödlareuth will begin operations. It was officially opened by the federal president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in early October, but the exhibition was not entirely ready. Speaking to the locals who lived through the past era, Steinmeier remarked: “You were observers of an brutal separation, which tore relatives apart and turned neighbors into foreigners.”

“You were observers of an inhuman split, which pulled relatives apart and turned local residents into aliens.”

Bygone Background

Starting at its creation in 1810, the community cut across the Bavarian Kingdom and the Principality of Reuss, a noble lineage best known for assigning all its men the designation Heinrich and labeling them in order by birth order. As Steinmeier told the audience, the peculiarity was never an obstacle in the manner of the locals drinking in the very same tavern, going to the identical place of worship and placing their young ones to the same learning center.

Following WWII Division

Subsequently occurred the second world war. As soon as they appeared, the Russians put up timber poles by the brook. For a annual period they seized the complete village, setting up their command in a building on the Bavarian side, decorating it with a portrait of Stalin and a red star. The US forces convinced them to pull back across the brook. For a while, residents could continue to hop over, though as restrictions became stricter they were forced to show identification, despite the fact that each person was aware who they were, and to return at after dark.

Intensification of Boundary Measures

Subsequently, in 1952, came wire fencing and the official sealing of the frontier. In 1966, as in Berlin half a decade before, a concrete structure was erected, with landmines, tank traps and watchtowers. The locals could continue to observe each other by ascending elevations, but on the Soviet side waving and yelling were prohibited. A female resident was put on a East German secret police watch list for responding “same to you” to a Bavarian resident who greeted her “prosperous new year”.

Museum Development

I was told accounts like these tales by Robert Lebegern, the director of the museum, who has spent much of his professional career developing it. Locals were asked at an early stage about how what length of structure they wanted to keep. They selected a portion on the west fringe, adjacent to where a villager succeeded to escape in the darkest hours with a climbing device, following which the frontier was heavily reinforced.

Maintained Installations

2 watchtowers are maintained together with a series of exhibits showing the most dramatic moments in the village’s chronicle. As we walk, Lebergen enumerates the regulations: no one could come within 5km of the boundary. Farmers needed special permission to look after their fields; the partner could operate the agricultural equipment but never the pair, for fear that they attempted to flee. Soldiers kept guard.

Wider Background

The boundary between the Federal Republic and the German Democratic Republic ran 1,400 kilometers, from the Baltic Sea in the northern part to this location in the southern region. Berlin is remembered and honored the greatest, but in excess of two times more persons (exceeding 300) lost their lives seeking to cross it in rural areas than in the urban center. Lebegern reminds me that 95 percent of attempts to flee did not succeed.

Hamlet Existence

The greater part of Mödlareuth’s villagers were agricultural workers or artisans, who adjusted to living in the grey zone between 2 political systems by staying low-profile and caring for their land. They nor did they supported the socialist government nor opposed it, the director explains.

Interest

For sightseers, however, the village became a type of pilgrimage. Roughly 15k came to visit every year, binoculars in possession, to stare – and then swiftly leave. In 1983, the American president, George Bush, was given a tour by the German defence minister.

25 years after merger, Tannbach, a television program about a made-up community resembling Mödlareuth, caused new interest.

Current Changes

The opening of the recently established museum – with a restaurant, store, cinema room and big car park – is likely to