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An stream so low you hardly got your feet wet split a community for more than four decades of time. By an accident of landscape, the 50 residents of Mödlareuth, a hamlet encircled by evergreen groves, fields and spectacular views, found themselves at the core of the cold war. They had the bad luck to cross the Bavarian region, in the Federal Republic of Germany, and Thuringia in the Soviet sector, a frontier that was demarcated first by a enclosure and then by a wall. US troops called it Mini Berlin.

Memorialising the Past

Months after their own division was torn down, and even before their nation had unified again in 1990, a group of local people set about commemorating their history. The project is close to come to fruition: on 9 November, the 36th annual anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, the Museum of German Division Mödlareuth will open. It was publicly launched by the national president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in the first part of October, but the display was not completely prepared. Telling the residents who lived through the past era, Steinmeier stated: “You were bystanders of an cruel division, which pulled families apart and turned neighbors into foreigners.”

“You were observers of an inhuman division, which ripped households apart and turned local residents into foreigners.”

Past Background

Right from its creation in 1810, the hamlet cut across the Bavarian Kingdom and the Princely State of Reuss, a princely house most famous for assigning all its male members the designation Heinrich and labeling them in order by birth order. As Steinmeier informed the crowd, the peculiarity was never an obstacle in the path of the inhabitants drinking in the same inn, going to the identical place of worship and enrolling their kids to the same educational institution.

Post-War Separation

Subsequently occurred the World War II. Immediately after they came, the Russians put up timber poles by the creek. For a twelve months they took over the complete village, creating their headquarters in a dwelling on the western side, embellishing it with a image of Stalin and a red star. The American soldiers persuaded them to pull back across the brook. For a time, villagers could still jump across, though as restrictions increased they were required to show ID, despite the fact that everyone was aware who they were, and to return at evening.

Escalation of Border Controls

Then, in 1952, came barbed wire and the formal closing of the frontier. In 1966, as in Berlin five years earlier, a concrete structure was erected, with explosives, tank traps and guard posts. The residents could still view each other by ascending slopes, but on the eastern side gesturing and shouting were forbidden. One woman was placed on a East German secret police surveillance list for answering “likewise” to a western villager who wished her “good new year”.

Museum Creation

It was related to me stories such as these tales by Robert Lebegern, the museum’s director, who has dedicated much of his working life developing it. Villagers were polled at an early stage about how what length of barrier they desired to preserve. They selected a portion on the west edge, close to where one of their own succeeded to flee in the dead of night with a scaling tool, following which the boundary was significantly reinforced.

Preserved Installations

2 watchtowers are conserved together with a collection of displays showing the most dramatic dates in the hamlet’s past. As we stroll, the director lists the restrictions: nobody could approach 5km of the frontier. Farmers required particular approval to tend to their fields; the spouse could operate the harvesting machine but never both, in case they attempted to make a run for it. Soldiers kept guard.

Broader Perspective

The boundary between Western Germany and the East Germany stretched 1,400km, from the Baltic coast in the northern part to the south in the south. Berlin is remembered and documented the most frequently, but in excess of double the number individuals (well over 300) lost their lives seeking to pass over it in countryside regions than in the big city. Robert Lebegern reminds me that 95% of escape attempts failed.

Community Daily Living

Most of Mödlareuth’s locals were farmers or skilled workers, who adapted to residing in the grey zone between a pair of political systems by avoiding attention and looking after their farms. They did not backed the East German authorities nor resisted it, Robert Lebegern states.

Visitors

For tourists, however, the hamlet became a kind of site of interest. Roughly 15k came to visit each year, optical devices in their hands, to stare – and then quickly leave. In 1983, the United States leader, George Bush, was given a tour by the German defence minister.

Twenty five years after unification, the television series, a TV series about a imaginary village like Mödlareuth, caused new interest.

Modern Developments

The launch of the new museum – with a coffee shop, shop, cinema room and big vehicle area – is expected to