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A brook so shallow you hardly got your ankles wet separated a settlement for over four decades worth of time. By an accident of geography, the half a hundred residents of Mödlareuth, a hamlet bordered by evergreen groves, fields and breathtaking views, found themselves at the heart of the Cold War tensions. They had the misfortune to span the Bavarian region, in the Federal Republic of Germany, and the Thuringian region in the Eastern part, a border that was marked first by a barrier and then by a barricade. United States military personnel called it Small Berlin.

Memorialising Historical Events

Several months after their own barrier was breached, and even before their state had unified again in 1990, a group of local people began memorialising their heritage. The effort is about to come to fruition: on 9 November, the 36th anniversary of the collapse of the Berlin Wall, the German-German Museum Mödlareuth will open. It was officially inaugurated by the federal president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in the beginning of October, but the show wasn’t quite finished. Speaking to the locals who experienced the old days, Steinmeier remarked: “You were witnesses of an inhuman split, which tore relatives apart and turned local residents into aliens.”

“You were bystanders of an inhuman separation, which pulled families asunder and turned local residents into foreigners.”

Bygone Background

Right from its establishment in 1810, the village cut across the Bavarian Kingdom and the Principality of Reuss, a princely house most renowned for bestowing all its male members the designation Heinrich and labeling them sequentially by date of birth. As Steinmeier told the crowd, the oddity did not stand in the way of the locals drinking in the same inn, attending the identical place of worship and sending their young ones to the same learning center.

Post-War Separation

Next arrived the global conflict. As soon as they appeared, the Soviet forces installed wood stakes by the stream. For a twelve months they seized the entire village, creating their command in a dwelling on the Bavarian territory side, adorning it with a image of Stalin and a Soviet emblem. The Americans convinced them to withdraw to the other side of the brook. For a while, residents could still jump across, though as restrictions increased they were required to show identification, although everyone was aware who they were, and to return at after dark.

Increase of Frontier Controls

After that, in 1952, came wire fencing and the official shutting of the frontier. In 1966, as in Berlin five years earlier, a concrete structure was erected, with landmines, vehicle barriers and guard posts. The villagers could continue to see each other by climbing slopes, but on the Soviet side signaling and calling out were forbidden. One woman was placed on a East German secret police monitoring list for replying “likewise” to a western local who greeted her “prosperous new year”.

Museum Development

I was told narratives such as these tales by Robert Lebegern, the director of the museum, who has devoted much of his working life building it. Locals were asked in the initial phases about how much structure they wished to preserve. They selected a section on the Bavarian edge, close to where a local resident managed to escape in the darkest hours with a ladder, subsequently the frontier was significantly strengthened.

Conserved Structures

Two guard towers are maintained together with a collection of exhibits depicting the most impactful dates in the community’s past. As we stroll, the director details the rules: nobody could come within 5km of the border. Farmers required particular approval to care for their produce; the spouse could use the agricultural equipment but never the pair, for fear that they attempted to escape. Military personnel were on duty.

Broader Background

The frontier between Western Germany and the German Democratic Republic ran 1,400 kilometers, from the Baltic Sea in the north to this location in the southern region. Berlin is remembered and documented the greatest, but over double the number individuals (well over 300) lost their lives trying to traverse it in countryside regions than in the metropolis. Robert Lebegern informs me that almost all of escape attempts were unsuccessful.

Village Daily Living

The majority of Mödlareuth’s locals were farmers or skilled workers, who adjusted to living in the grey zone between two belief systems by keeping their heads down and caring for their fields. They did not supported the communist regime nor resisted it, Robert Lebegern states.

Interest

For visitors, however, the hamlet became a sort of pilgrimage. About 15,000 came to visit every year, binoculars in hand, to gawp – and then quickly go away. In 1983, the US president, George Bush, was given a tour by the German defense official.

Twenty five years after reunification, the TV show, a broadcast production about a fictional community like Mödlareuth, caused fresh curiosity.

Current Evolutions

The opening of the new museum – with a cafe, boutique, film screening area and sizable vehicle area – is expected to