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A stream so narrow you barely got your feet wet separated a village for in excess of four decades worth of time. By an accident of topography, the half a hundred locals of Mödlareuth, a hamlet encircled by evergreen groves, meadows and breathtaking views, found themselves at the heart of the Cold War conflict. They had the bad luck to span Bavaria, in Western Germany, and Thuringia in the Soviet sector, a boundary that was established first by a barrier and then by a barricade. United States military personnel nicknamed it Mini Berlin.

Preserving the Past

A few months after their own barrier was torn down, and prior to their country had reunified in 1990, a collection of villagers began commemorating their heritage. The work is about to reach completion: on 9 November, the thirty-sixth remembrance of the collapse of the Wall in Berlin, the Museum of German Division Mödlareuth will open. It was publicly launched by the federal president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in the first part of October, but the exhibition wasn’t quite ready. Speaking to the locals who lived through the old days, Steinmeier remarked: “You were observers of an brutal separation, which ripped households into pieces and turned neighbors into strangers.”

“You were bystanders of an inhuman division, which tore relatives asunder and turned local residents into foreigners.”

Bygone Context

Right from its establishment in 1810, the hamlet cut across the Bavarian Kingdom and the Principality of Reuss, a royal family best known for assigning all its men the name Heinrich and labeling them in order by date of birth. As Steinmeier told the crowd, the quirk did not stand in the path of the inhabitants gathering in the identical tavern, going to the identical place of worship and sending their children to the identical educational institution.

Following WWII Separation

Next arrived the global conflict. As soon as they appeared, the Russians erected wooden posts by the stream. For a twelve months they occupied the entire hamlet, creating their command in a building on the western side, adorning it with a portrait of Stalin and a communist symbol. The US forces convinced them to withdraw across the brook. For a period, residents could continue to hop over, though as controls became stricter they were required to show identification, although everyone understood who they were, and to come back at evening.

Intensification of Frontier Measures

After that, in 1952, came metal barriers and the formal closing of the frontier. In 1966, as in Berlin five years earlier, a concrete structure was constructed, with landmines, vehicle barriers and watchtowers. The locals could still see each other by scaling elevations, but on the eastern side gesturing and yelling were banned. A female resident was added to a East German secret police monitoring list for responding “back at you” to a western villager who said her “good new year”.

Museum Development

I was told accounts like these by Robert Lebegern, the museum’s director, who has devoted a significant portion of his professional career building it. Residents were polled at an early stage about how what length of barrier they wished to keep. They opted for a stretch on the Bavarian fringe, adjacent to where one of their own succeeded to get away in the middle of the night with a scaling tool, after which the border was substantially strengthened.

Maintained Structures

2 observation towers are conserved in addition to a series of displays showing the most significant dates in the village’s chronicle. As we stroll, the director enumerates the regulations: no one could come within 5km of the frontier. Agricultural workers had to obtain special permission to look after their crops; the partner could use the harvesting machine but under no circumstances the two, lest they attempted to escape. Armed guards were on duty.

Wider Background

The frontier between West Germany and the German Democratic Republic ran 1,400km, from the Baltic Sea in the northern part to this location in the southern region. Berlin is remembered and memorialised the most frequently, but more than twice as many individuals (exceeding 300) lost their lives seeking to cross it in countryside regions than in the big city. Robert Lebegern tells me that 95% of attempts to flee failed.

Hamlet Daily Living

The majority of Mödlareuth’s locals were farmers or craftsmen, who adapted to residing in the grey zone between two political systems by staying low-profile and tending to their fields. They did not backed the East German authorities nor fought it, Lebegern explains.

Tourism

For visitors, however, the hamlet became a type of pilgrimage. About 15,000 came to see annually, optical devices in possession, to stare – and then rapidly depart. In 1983, the US president, George Bush, was shown around by the German defence minister.

25 years after merger, the TV show, a TV series about a imaginary hamlet like Mödlareuth, caused fresh curiosity.

Present-Day Developments

The opening of the modern exhibition center – with a cafe, store, cinema room and big vehicle area – is likely to