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A creek so shallow you scarcely got your ankles wet separated a settlement for over four decades of time. Because of a chance of landscape, the half a hundred residents of Mödlareuth, a hamlet encircled by pine forests, fields and stunning vistas, found themselves at the core of the Cold War tensions. They had the misfortune to cross Bavaria, in Western Germany, and Thuringia in the East, a border that was marked first by a barrier and then by a partition. American soldiers nicknamed it Mini Berlin.

Preserving the Past

Months after their own wall was breached, and prior to their nation had unified again in 1990, a collection of local people began documenting their history. The effort is about to come to fruition: on 9 November, the thirty-sixth remembrance of the demolition of the Wall in Berlin, the Museum of German Division Mödlareuth will open. It was publicly launched by the head of state, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in the beginning of October, but the show wasn’t quite ready. Telling the villagers who experienced the old days, Steinmeier stated: “You were witnesses of an brutal separation, which pulled relatives into pieces and turned neighbors into aliens.”

“You were observers of an inhuman split, which ripped households apart and turned neighbors into foreigners.”

Bygone Context

Even at its creation in 1810, the hamlet cut across the Royal Bavaria and the Principality of Reuss, a noble lineage most famous for giving all its male descendants the title Heinrich and numbering them in order by birth. As Steinmeier informed the crowd, the peculiarity did not stand in the manner of the residents gathering in the same pub, attending the identical religious building and enrolling their kids to the very same school.

Following WWII Division

Then came the global conflict. The moment they appeared, the Russians installed wooden posts by the creek. For a annual period they occupied the complete village, setting up their control center in a house on the Bavarian territory side, decorating it with a picture of Stalin and a communist symbol. The Americans convinced them to retreat back over the creek. For a period, villagers could still hop over, though as restrictions increased they were obliged to display ID, even though all understood who they were, and to come back at evening.

Increase of Frontier Controls

Subsequently, in 1952, came wire fencing and the official shutting of the border. In 1966, as in Berlin half a decade before, a wall was constructed, with landmines, anti-tank obstacles and watchtowers. The locals could still see each other by climbing elevations, but on the eastern side waving and yelling were forbidden. One woman was added to a East German secret police monitoring list for replying “same to you” to a Bavarian local who said her “happy new year”.

Exhibition Center Creation

It was related to me accounts including these tales by Robert Lebegern, the head of the institution, who has devoted much of his occupational time developing it. Villagers were polled in the initial phases about how what length of wall they desired to maintain. They opted for a stretch on the Bavarian edge, adjacent to where a villager was able to escape in the darkest hours with a ladder, following which the frontier was substantially reinforced.

Preserved Installations

Two guard towers are maintained together with a series of exhibits showing the most dramatic events in the hamlet’s history. As we walk, Robert Lebegern lists the rules: nobody could come within 5km of the border. Farmers had to obtain particular approval to look after their crops; the partner could work the combine harvester but not both, in case they sought to flee. Military personnel kept guard.

Larger Background

The border between Western Germany and the GDR extended 1,400 kilometers, from the Baltic coast in the north to the south in the south. Berlin is commemorated and memorialised the most, but in excess of twice as many persons (more than 300) lost their lives attempting to traverse it in provincial zones than in the metropolis. Lebegern informs me that almost all of escape attempts did not succeed.

Community Daily Living

Most of Mödlareuth’s villagers were farmers or craftsmen, who adjusted to living in the grey zone between two ideological spheres by avoiding attention and looking after their land. They nor did they backed the communist regime nor fought it, the director clarifies.

Visitors

For tourists, however, the settlement became a type of site of interest. Approximately fifteen thousand visited every year, binoculars in possession, to gawp – and then swiftly depart. In 1983, the American president, George Bush, was shown around by the national security head.

Twenty five years after reunification, the television series, a TV series about a imaginary hamlet like Mödlareuth, resulted in fresh attention.

Present-Day Developments

The launch of the recently established museum – with a coffee shop, shop, cinema room and big car park – is expected to