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A brook so shallow you barely got your feet wet separated a settlement for over four decades worth of time. Due to a quirk of geography, the fifty locals of Mödlareuth, a small village encircled by pine forests, meadows and stunning vistas, found themselves at the heart of the Cold War tensions. They had the bad luck to cross Bavaria, in Western Germany, and Thuringia in the Eastern part, a border that was established first by a enclosure and then by a barricade. United States military personnel called it Mini Berlin.

Memorialising the Past

Months after their own wall was breached, and prior to their state had unified again in 1990, a group of residents set about memorialising their history. The work is about to be completed: on 9 November, the thirty-sixth anniversary of the fall of the German barrier, the Deutsch-Deutsches Museum Mödlareuth will begin operations. It was publicly launched by the national president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in the beginning of October, but the display was not entirely finished. Speaking to the locals who lived through the past era, Steinmeier remarked: “You were bystanders of an inhuman split, which tore households asunder and turned neighbours into aliens.”

“You were witnesses of an inhuman split, which tore relatives into pieces and turned local residents into strangers.”

Bygone Origins

Starting at its founding in 1810, the hamlet cut across the Kingdom of Bavaria and the Principality of Reuss, a noble lineage most renowned for assigning all its men the designation Heinrich and labeling them in order by birth order. As Steinmeier related to the gathering, the oddity was never an obstacle in the way of the locals gathering in the identical tavern, visiting the very same place of worship and sending their kids to the very same educational institution.

Following WWII Separation

Then came the global conflict. Immediately after they came, the Russians installed wooden posts by the stream. For a annual period they occupied the entire village, establishing their command in a dwelling on the western side, adorning it with a picture of Stalin and a communist symbol. The American soldiers urged them to pull back to the other side of the stream. For a period, villagers could still cross over, though as controls tightened they were required to display ID, although everyone knew who they were, and to go back at night.

Escalation of Boundary Controls

After that, in 1952, came metal barriers and the formal sealing of the boundary. In 1966, as in Berlin previously in 1961, a concrete structure was erected, with mines, vehicle barriers and guard posts. The residents could still see each other by climbing hills, but on the eastern side waving and yelling were forbidden. A local woman was added to a GDR intelligence watch list for answering “same to you” to a West German local who greeted her “good new year”.

Heritage Site Establishment

I was told accounts such as these by Robert Lebegern, the head of the institution, who has dedicated a significant portion of his working life developing it. Villagers were asked at an early stage about how what length of wall they wanted to preserve. They chose a portion on the western fringe, near where a local resident was able to escape in the middle of the night with a scaling tool, after which the frontier was substantially reinforced.

Maintained Buildings

Two watchtowers are preserved alongside a series of exhibits showing the most significant moments in the hamlet’s chronicle. As we stroll, the director details the rules: not a single person could get closer than 5km of the border. Rural residents needed specific authorization to look after their crops; the partner could operate the agricultural equipment but never the two, lest they tried to make a run for it. Soldiers were on duty.

Broader Context

The border between West Germany and the GDR stretched 1,400km, from the Baltic Sea in the northern part to here in the south. Berlin is commemorated and honored the most, but over twice as many persons (well over 300) lost their lives trying to cross it in provincial zones than in the metropolis. Lebegern tells me that 95 percent of attempts to flee were unsuccessful.

Village Existence

Most of Mödlareuth’s villagers were rural laborers or skilled workers, who accommodated to living in the uncertain territory between 2 ideological spheres by staying low-profile and caring for their farms. They nor did they supported the East German authorities nor fought it, Robert Lebegern states.

Interest

For visitors, however, the settlement became a sort of pilgrimage. About fifteen thousand came to see each year, optical devices in their hands, to stare – and then quickly depart. In 1983, the United States leader, George Bush, was shown around by the German defense official.

Twenty five years after merger, the TV show, a television program about a fictional community resembling Mödlareuth, led to fresh interest.

Modern Developments

The inauguration of the recently established museum – with a restaurant, store, film screening area and big vehicle area – is probable to