🔗 Share this article

A brook so low you hardly got your ankles wet divided a village for in excess of four decades worth of time. By an accident of topography, the fifty inhabitants of Mödlareuth, a tiny settlement encircled by pine forests, meadows and stunning views, found themselves at the core of the Cold War tensions. They had the unfortunate circumstance to straddle Bavaria, in Western Germany, and the Thuringian region in the Eastern part, a boundary that was established first by a fence and then by a barricade. American soldiers dubbed it Mini Berlin.

Memorialising History

A few months after their own division was torn down, and even before their state had reunified in 1990, a collection of villagers started commemorating their history. The effort is soon to reach completion: on 9 November, the thirty-sixth commemoration of the collapse of the German barrier, the Deutsch-Deutsches Museum Mödlareuth will open. It was officially inaugurated by the head of state, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in early October, but the exhibition was not completely prepared. Telling the villagers who endured the past era, Steinmeier remarked: “You were bystanders of an cruel division, which tore households asunder and turned neighbors into strangers.”

“You were observers of an brutal division, which ripped households apart and turned neighbors into strangers.”

Historical Background

Right from its creation in 1810, the community straddled the Kingdom of Bavaria and the Principality of Reuss, a noble lineage most famous for assigning all its male descendants the title Heinrich and numbering them sequentially by date of birth. As Steinmeier informed the gathering, the quirk was never an obstacle in the way of the residents drinking in the identical pub, visiting the very same place of worship and sending their young ones to the very same school.

Post-War Separation

Then came the global conflict. As soon as they came, the Soviet forces put up timber poles by the brook. For a year they took over the complete community, establishing their command in a house on the Bavarian side, adorning it with a image of Stalin and a communist symbol. The American soldiers urged them to withdraw back over the brook. For a period, villagers could continue to hop over, though as limitations became stricter they were required to present identity papers, despite the fact that each person understood who they were, and to go back at after dark.

Intensification of Frontier Restrictions

After that, in 1952, came barbed wire and the formal shutting of the border. In 1966, as in Berlin half a decade before, a barrier was built, with explosives, anti-tank obstacles and guard posts. The villagers could continue to observe each other by ascending elevations, but on the eastern side signaling and shouting were banned. A female resident was put on a East German secret police surveillance list for responding “same to you” to a Bavarian villager who greeted her “happy new year”.

Museum Establishment

I heard stories including these incidents by Robert Lebegern, the director of the museum, who has dedicated a large part of his occupational time creating it. Villagers were polled early on about how how long a section barrier they wanted to preserve. They opted for a stretch on the west fringe, adjacent to where one of their own managed to flee in the middle of the night with a ladder, subsequently the boundary was heavily fortified.

Conserved Buildings

Two guard towers are preserved alongside a collection of displays illustrating the most significant dates in the hamlet’s history. As we walk, Lebergen enumerates the restrictions: not a single person could approach 5km of the frontier. Rural residents needed specific authorization to tend to their produce; the partner could use the combine harvester but not the pair, lest they tried to escape. Military personnel kept guard.

Wider Context

The border between the Federal Republic and the German Democratic Republic extended 1,400 kilometers, from the Baltic Sea in the northern part to the south in the south. Berlin is commemorated and documented the most, but in excess of double the number individuals (exceeding 300) were killed seeking to traverse it in rural areas than in the urban center. the director informs me that 95 percent of attempts to flee failed.

Village Existence

Most of Mödlareuth’s residents were farmers or skilled workers, who adjusted to dwelling in the uncertain territory between a pair of political systems by avoiding attention and looking after their land. They did not endorsed the communist regime nor resisted it, Lebegern states.

Visitors

For tourists, however, the hamlet became a type of site of interest. Approximately 15,000 came to see every year, viewing tools in hand, to look – and then quickly go away. In 1983, the US president, George Bush, was given a tour by the German defence minister.

25 years after merger, the television series, a broadcast production about a imaginary village like Mödlareuth, caused fresh curiosity.

Modern Changes

The launch of the recently established museum – with a restaurant, shop, film screening area and large parking lot – is likely to