🔗 Share this article

A brook so shallow you barely got your feet wet split a settlement for more than four decades of time. By an accident of landscape, the half a hundred locals of Mödlareuth, a tiny settlement bordered by pine forests, pastures and stunning views, found themselves at the center of the Cold War conflict. They had the unfortunate circumstance to straddle Bavaria, in West Germany, and the Thuringian region in the East, a boundary that was established first by a fence and then by a wall. United States military personnel nicknamed it Small Berlin.

Preserving the Past

Months after their own barrier was opened, and before their country had unified again in 1990, a group of local people started documenting their heritage. The project is close to be completed: on 9 November, the thirty-sixth anniversary of the collapse of the Berlin Wall, the Museum of German Division Mödlareuth will open. It was publicly inaugurated by the federal president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in the first part of October, but the show was not completely finished. Addressing the villagers who lived through the former times, Steinmeier said: “You were observers of an inhuman division, which tore households into pieces and turned neighbors into aliens.”

“You were witnesses of an brutal split, which tore households into pieces and turned neighbors into foreigners.”

Historical Context

Even at its creation in 1810, the village cut across the Royal Bavaria and the Princely State of Reuss, a princely house best known for assigning all its male members the designation Heinrich and numbering them consecutively by birth. As Steinmeier informed the audience, the peculiarity never stood in the path of the locals drinking in the same pub, visiting the very same place of worship and sending their kids to the same educational institution.

Following WWII Division

Subsequently occurred the global conflict. The moment they came, the Soviet forces erected wood stakes by the stream. For a year they seized the entire hamlet, creating their command in a house on the Bavarian territory side, adorning it with a picture of Stalin and a communist symbol. The US forces urged them to withdraw to the other side of the stream. For a period, locals could continue to cross over, though as limitations increased they were forced to present ID, even though each person knew who they were, and to go back at after dark.

Escalation of Frontier Measures

After that, in 1952, came barbed wire and the formal shutting of the border. In 1966, as in Berlin previously in 1961, a concrete structure was built, with mines, anti-tank obstacles and guard posts. The locals could still observe each other by climbing hills, but on the eastern side gesturing and calling out were prohibited. A local woman was placed on a East German secret police watch list for responding “back at you” to a western villager who greeted her “happy new year”.

Exhibition Center Establishment

I was told narratives like these tales by Robert Lebegern, the director of the museum, who has spent much of his professional career building it. Residents were asked at an early stage about how how long a section barrier they wished to keep. They selected a portion on the western perimeter, close to where a villager was able to get away in the darkest hours with a ladder, subsequently the boundary was substantially strengthened.

Preserved Installations

2 guard towers are maintained in addition to a collection of exhibits showing the most impactful dates in the community’s history. As we stroll, the director lists the restrictions: not a single person could get closer than 5km of the boundary. Rural residents needed specific authorization to look after their produce; the spouse could use the agricultural equipment but not both, for fear that they tried to make a run for it. Military personnel stood watch.

Wider Background

The frontier between West Germany and the GDR ran 1,400km, from the Baltic coast in the northern part to the south in the south. Berlin is commemorated and documented the most frequently, but in excess of double the number individuals (exceeding 300) lost their lives attempting to cross it in provincial zones than in the metropolis. Lebegern tells me that 95% of escape attempts did not succeed.

Community Life

Most of Mödlareuth’s locals were rural laborers or artisans, who adjusted to residing in the uncertain territory between a pair of political systems by avoiding attention and caring for their land. They did not supported the socialist government nor resisted it, Lebegern clarifies.

Interest

For tourists, however, the village became a sort of destination. About 15,000 came to visit annually, viewing tools in possession, to gawp – and then swiftly go away. In 1983, the United States leader, George Bush, was guided by the German defense official.

Twenty-five years after merger, Tannbach, a television program about a made-up hamlet like Mödlareuth, caused fresh interest.

Current Evolutions

The inauguration of the recently established museum – with a cafe, shop, movie theater and large vehicle area – is likely to