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A creek so low you scarcely got your ankles wet split a community for over four decades of time. Because of a chance of topography, the half a hundred locals of Mödlareuth, a tiny settlement encircled by pine forests, meadows and stunning vistas, found themselves at the heart of the Cold War tensions. They had the unfortunate circumstance to cross Bavaria, in the Federal Republic of Germany, and Thuringia in the East, a frontier that was demarcated first by a enclosure and then by a wall. United States military personnel dubbed it Little Berlin.

Preserving the Past

Months after their own division was breached, and prior to their nation had unified again in 1990, a group of local people began documenting their past. The work is soon to reach completion: on 9 November, the thirty-sixth remembrance of the collapse of the German barrier, the German-German Museum Mödlareuth will open. It was publicly opened by the national president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in early October, but the display wasn’t quite prepared. Telling the villagers who lived through the past era, Steinmeier stated: “You were observers of an inhuman division, which ripped relatives apart and turned local residents into foreigners.”

“You were observers of an inhuman separation, which tore relatives asunder and turned neighbors into strangers.”

Past Background

Even at its establishment in 1810, the village cut across the Royal Bavaria and the Princely State of Reuss, a royal family most famous for giving all its male members the name Heinrich and counting them sequentially by birth. As Steinmeier related to the crowd, the oddity never stood in the path of the residents gathering in the very same inn, visiting the same place of worship and placing their children to the very same learning center.

After the War Separation

Then came the global conflict. Immediately after they came, the Soviet forces put up wooden posts by the creek. For a year they seized the whole community, creating their control center in a house on the western side, decorating it with a portrait of Stalin and a red star. The Americans persuaded them to pull back across the stream. For a time, locals could still hop over, though as controls tightened they were obliged to show identity papers, despite the fact that all was aware who they were, and to come back at after dark.

Intensification of Border Measures

After that, in 1952, came wire fencing and the legal closing of the border. In 1966, as in Berlin previously in 1961, a wall was constructed, with landmines, anti-tank obstacles and watchtowers. The villagers could still observe each other by ascending elevations, but on the east side signaling and shouting were banned. A female resident was put on a East German secret police watch list for replying “back at you” to a western villager who wished her “prosperous new year”.

Heritage Site Development

It was related to me narratives like these by Robert Lebegern, the museum’s director, who has spent much of his professional career building it. Residents were polled early on about how how long a section wall they wished to preserve. They opted for a portion on the west fringe, near where a local resident was able to get away in the darkest hours with a scaling tool, following which the boundary was heavily fortified.

Preserved Buildings

Two watchtowers are preserved together with a collection of exhibits showing the most impactful moments in the community’s past. As we walk, the director details the restrictions: no one could get closer than 5km of the frontier. Farmers needed special permission to look after their produce; the spouse could operate the harvesting machine but under no circumstances the pair, lest they attempted to flee. Armed guards stood watch.

Broader Context

The boundary between the Federal Republic and the German Democratic Republic ran 1,400 kilometers, from the Baltic Sea in the northern part to here in the southern region. Berlin is remembered and honored the most frequently, but over twice as many people (well over 300) were killed attempting to cross it in rural areas than in the big city. the director informs me that 95% of efforts to cross were unsuccessful.

Community Life

The greater part of Mödlareuth’s locals were rural laborers or skilled workers, who accommodated to dwelling in the uncertain territory between two political systems by avoiding attention and caring for their farms. They nor did they supported the socialist government nor fought it, Lebegern explains.

Visitors

For sightseers, however, the hamlet became a kind of site of interest. Roughly 15,000 visited each year, viewing tools in possession, to look – and then rapidly go away. In 1983, the United States leader, George Bush, was given a tour by the German defense official.

25 years after unification, Tannbach, a broadcast production about a fictional hamlet resembling Mödlareuth, caused fresh attention.

Modern Evolutions

The inauguration of the recently established museum – with a restaurant, boutique, cinema room and sizable parking lot – is likely to