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An stream so low you barely got your feet wet separated a community for in excess of four decades. Due to a quirk of topography, the 50 inhabitants of Mödlareuth, a hamlet bordered by pine forests, meadows and stunning vistas, found themselves at the core of the cold war. They had the unfortunate circumstance to straddle the Bavarian region, in the Federal Republic of Germany, and the Thuringian region in the Soviet sector, a boundary that was marked first by a enclosure and then by a barricade. United States military personnel nicknamed it Little Berlin.

Commemorating the Past

Months after their own barrier was breached, and even before their nation had become one in 1990, a assembly of local people began documenting their heritage. The project is soon to be completed: on 9 November, the 36th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, the German-German Museum Mödlareuth will inaugurate. It was officially launched by the head of state, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in the first part of October, but the show wasn’t quite finished. Addressing the villagers who experienced the former times, Steinmeier remarked: “You were bystanders of an cruel separation, which tore households apart and turned local residents into strangers.”

“You were bystanders of an inhuman split, which tore relatives apart and turned neighbors into aliens.”

Bygone Origins

Even at its founding in 1810, the community straddled the Royal Bavaria and the Reuss Principality, a noble lineage best known for assigning all its male members the title Heinrich and counting them in order by birth order. As Steinmeier related to the audience, the oddity never stood in the way of the residents socializing in the same pub, going to the same place of worship and sending their children to the very same school.

Following WWII Split

Then came the second world war. Immediately after they came, the Russians installed wooden posts by the creek. For a twelve months they occupied the entire village, creating their control center in a house on the Bavarian side, adorning it with a portrait of Stalin and a communist symbol. The American soldiers urged them to retreat across the creek. For a time, locals could continue to hop over, though as limitations became stricter they were obliged to show identity papers, although each person was aware who they were, and to go back at evening.

Increase of Border Controls

Then, in 1952, came metal barriers and the formal closing of the boundary. In 1966, as in Berlin previously in 1961, a barrier was constructed, with landmines, tank traps and watchtowers. The locals could continue to observe each other by climbing hills, but on the east side waving and yelling were forbidden. A local woman was put on a East German secret police monitoring list for answering “same to you” to a West German resident who said her “good new year”.

Museum Development

It was related to me stories like these by Robert Lebegern, the director of the museum, who has dedicated a significant portion of his occupational time creating it. Villagers were asked early on about how what length of structure they wanted to keep. They selected a portion on the Bavarian fringe, adjacent to where one of their own managed to get away in the darkest hours with a climbing device, after which the boundary was significantly strengthened.

Maintained Installations

2 guard towers are preserved alongside a set of tableaux depicting the most dramatic dates in the hamlet’s history. As we stroll, Robert Lebegern lists the rules: not a single person could approach 5km of the frontier. Rural residents needed particular approval to tend to their fields; the spouse could use the agricultural equipment but not both, for fear that they tried to flee. Soldiers stood watch.

Larger Background

The border between West Germany and the East Germany ran 1,400 kilometers, from the Baltic Sea in the north to here in the southern region. Berlin is recalled and honored the most, but more than double the number persons (exceeding 300) died seeking to pass over it in rural areas than in the metropolis. Robert Lebegern tells me that almost all of attempts to flee were unsuccessful.

Community Existence

The greater part of Mödlareuth’s villagers were agricultural workers or craftsmen, who adjusted to residing in the grey zone between 2 ideological spheres by staying low-profile and tending to their fields. They neither supported the socialist government nor fought it, the director clarifies.

Tourism

For sightseers, however, the hamlet became a type of destination. Roughly 15,000 came to visit every year, binoculars in possession, to gawp – and then quickly leave. In 1983, the United States leader, George Bush, was shown around by the German defense official.

25 years after merger, the TV show, a broadcast production about a imaginary village similar to Mödlareuth, led to new interest.

Current Developments

The launch of the recently established museum – with a coffee shop, shop, movie theater and large car park – is likely to