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An creek so shallow you hardly got your feet wet divided a community for in excess of four decades of time. By an accident of landscape, the 50 residents of Mödlareuth, a tiny settlement surrounded by evergreen groves, fields and breathtaking views, found themselves at the core of the Cold War tensions. They had the unfortunate circumstance to span Bavaria, in the Federal Republic of Germany, and Thuringia in the Soviet sector, a border that was marked first by a barrier and then by a partition. United States military personnel called it Mini Berlin.

Commemorating History

Months after their own barrier was torn down, and before their country had reunified in 1990, a assembly of local people set about commemorating their past. The effort is close to be completed: on 9 November, the 36th annual commemoration of the collapse of the German barrier, the Museum of German Division Mödlareuth will begin operations. It was formally opened by the head of state, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in the beginning of October, but the show was not entirely finished. Speaking to the residents who lived through the past era, Steinmeier remarked: “You were bystanders of an brutal split, which tore families apart and turned neighbours into strangers.”

“You were bystanders of an inhuman separation, which tore households apart and turned neighbors into foreigners.”

Historical Background

Right from its establishment in 1810, the community spanned the Kingdom of Bavaria and the Principality of Reuss, a noble lineage most famous for giving all its men the title Heinrich and labeling them in order by birth order. As Steinmeier told the crowd, the oddity never stood in the way of the residents socializing in the same inn, attending the identical place of worship and enrolling their young ones to the same educational institution.

Post-War Split

Next arrived the global conflict. The moment they appeared, the Russians erected timber poles by the stream. For a year they took over the complete hamlet, setting up their command in a building on the western side, adorning it with a image of Stalin and a communist symbol. The US forces persuaded them to withdraw to the other side of the creek. For a period, residents could still jump across, though as restrictions became stricter they were obliged to display identification, although everyone was aware who they were, and to go back at evening.

Increase of Boundary Restrictions

Then, in 1952, came wire fencing and the legal sealing of the frontier. In 1966, as in Berlin previously in 1961, a concrete structure was erected, with mines, vehicle barriers and observation points. The residents could still see each other by ascending hills, but on the east side signaling and calling out were banned. A female resident was put on a GDR intelligence monitoring list for answering “likewise” to a western villager who greeted her “happy new year”.

Heritage Site Creation

I heard accounts like these tales by Robert Lebegern, the museum’s director, who has dedicated much of his occupational time building it. Locals were polled in the initial phases about how much structure they wanted to maintain. They chose a portion on the west fringe, near where a local resident was able to escape in the middle of the night with a scaling tool, after which the boundary was heavily reinforced.

Maintained Structures

A pair of guard towers are maintained alongside a set of displays illustrating the most dramatic dates in the hamlet’s past. As we move, Lebergen lists the rules: no one could get closer than 5km of the border. Farmers required special permission to tend to their crops; the partner could operate the combine harvester but not the two, in case they sought to make a run for it. Armed guards kept guard.

Broader Background

The frontier between West Germany and the East Germany extended 1,400 kilometers, from the Baltic coast in the northern part to here in the south. Berlin is recalled and honored the greatest, but more than double the number persons (well over 300) died trying to cross it in provincial zones than in the metropolis. Lebegern reminds me that almost all of escape attempts failed.

Hamlet Existence

Most of Mödlareuth’s villagers were agricultural workers or craftsmen, who adjusted to living in the grey zone between a pair of ideological spheres by keeping their heads down and caring for their land. They did not supported the East German authorities nor resisted it, the director explains.

Visitors

For sightseers, however, the hamlet became a kind of pilgrimage. Approximately 15,000 visited annually, binoculars in possession, to look – and then swiftly go away. In 1983, the American president, George Bush, was given a tour by the German defence minister.

Twenty five years after reunification, Tannbach, a broadcast production about a fictional community similar to Mödlareuth, led to renewed curiosity.

Modern Developments

The opening of the new museum – with a restaurant, store, cinema room and large vehicle area – is likely to