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A brook so narrow you scarcely got your feet wet separated a settlement for over four decades worth of time. Due to a quirk of topography, the 50 inhabitants of Mödlareuth, a tiny settlement encircled by evergreen groves, meadows and breathtaking views, found themselves at the core of the Cold War conflict. They had the bad luck to span Bavaria, in West Germany, and Thuringia in the Soviet sector, a border that was demarcated first by a enclosure and then by a partition. American soldiers dubbed it Small Berlin.

Memorialising History

A few months after their own barrier was opened, and before their country had become one in 1990, a collection of residents began commemorating their past. The project is soon to come to fruition: on 9 November, the 36th remembrance of the demolition of the German barrier, the Museum of German Division Mödlareuth will inaugurate. It was officially opened by the federal president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in the first part of October, but the display was not entirely ready. Telling the residents who lived through the old days, Steinmeier stated: “You were bystanders of an inhuman separation, which tore households apart and turned neighbours into strangers.”

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

Historical Context

Even at its establishment in 1810, the hamlet cut across the Royal Bavaria and the Principality of Reuss, a royal family most renowned for giving all its male descendants the designation Heinrich and counting them consecutively by birth. As Steinmeier told the crowd, the oddity did not stand in the path of the locals gathering in the very same pub, going to the same place of worship and placing their kids to the identical educational institution.

Following WWII Split

Then came the World War II. As soon as they came, the Russians erected timber poles by the brook. For a year they occupied the complete community, creating their control center in a house on the western side, decorating it with a picture of Stalin and a Soviet emblem. The US forces convinced them to retreat across the stream. For a while, residents could still jump across, though as restrictions became stricter they were forced to display identification, despite the fact that all was aware who they were, and to return at night.

Increase of Boundary Measures

After that, in 1952, came wire fencing and the formal sealing of the border. In 1966, as in Berlin previously in 1961, a concrete structure was built, with mines, vehicle barriers and guard posts. The residents could still see each other by climbing slopes, but on the eastern side signaling and calling out were forbidden. A local woman was added to a East German secret police surveillance list for answering “same to you” to a western villager who wished her “happy new year”.

Exhibition Center Development

It was related to me narratives including these tales by Robert Lebegern, the director of the museum, who has spent a large part of his occupational time building it. Residents were consulted at an early stage about how much wall they wished to keep. They opted for a portion on the western fringe, adjacent to where a villager succeeded to escape in the darkest hours with a climbing device, following which the boundary was heavily strengthened.

Conserved Installations

Two guard towers are preserved together with a collection of exhibits depicting the most dramatic events in the village’s chronicle. As we move, the director lists the restrictions: nobody could come within 5km of the boundary. Agricultural workers required special permission to look after their crops; the spouse could operate the combine harvester but never the two, for fear that they tried to flee. Soldiers stood watch.

Broader Background

The border between West Germany and the GDR extended 1,400km, from the Baltic coast in the northern part to here in the south. Berlin is recalled and memorialised the most, but more than two times more individuals (more than 300) died attempting to pass over it in rural areas than in the urban center. Lebegern reminds me that almost all of efforts to cross failed.

Community Existence

Most of Mödlareuth’s locals were rural laborers or craftsmen, who adjusted to living in the uncertain territory between 2 political systems by staying low-profile and caring for their fields. They did not backed the East German authorities nor opposed it, Lebegern states.

Tourism

For sightseers, however, the settlement became a kind of site of interest. Roughly fifteen thousand came to see each year, viewing tools in possession, to gawp – and then quickly go away. In 1983, the US president, George Bush, was guided by the national security head.

Twenty-five years after unification, the television series, a TV series about a imaginary community like Mödlareuth, resulted in renewed attention.

Present-Day Developments

The inauguration of the modern exhibition center – with a restaurant, shop, movie theater and large car park – is expected to