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An stream so low you barely got your feet wet split a community for more than four decades worth of time. Because of a chance of topography, the 50 residents of Mödlareuth, a small village surrounded by pine forests, meadows and spectacular scenery, found themselves at the heart of the cold war. They had the bad luck to span the Bavarian region, in West Germany, and Thuringia in the East, a frontier that was demarcated first by a enclosure and then by a barricade. United States military personnel nicknamed it Small Berlin.

Commemorating Historical Events

Several months after their own division was torn down, and even before their nation had unified again in 1990, a collection of local people began commemorating their past. The work is close to be completed: on 9 November, the 36th annual remembrance of the demolition of the German barrier, the Deutsch-Deutsches Museum Mödlareuth will begin operations. It was officially inaugurated by the national president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in early October, but the display was not completely prepared. Telling the locals who endured the former times, Steinmeier said: “You were witnesses of an cruel split, which tore relatives into pieces and turned local residents into strangers.”

“You were observers of an cruel separation, which ripped households asunder and turned local residents into aliens.”

Historical Context

Even at its creation in 1810, the community cut across the Kingdom of Bavaria and the Princely State of Reuss, a noble lineage best known for giving all its male descendants the title Heinrich and labeling them consecutively by birth. As Steinmeier told the audience, the oddity never stood in the path of the residents socializing in the very same inn, going to the very same place of worship and enrolling their young ones to the same educational institution.

After the War Split

Subsequently occurred the World War II. As soon as they appeared, the Russians erected timber poles by the creek. For a year they occupied the complete village, setting up their control center in a building on the Bavarian side, decorating it with a portrait of Stalin and a communist symbol. The American soldiers urged them to retreat back over the stream. For a time, locals could still hop over, though as limitations increased they were forced to show identification, although each person understood who they were, and to return at after dark.

Intensification of Boundary Measures

Then, in 1952, came wire fencing and the official sealing of the frontier. In 1966, as in Berlin five years earlier, a concrete structure was erected, with landmines, tank traps and observation points. The residents could still see each other by ascending hills, but on the east side waving and yelling were banned. A local woman was placed on a East German secret police surveillance list for answering “back at you” to a western local who said her “prosperous new year”.

Heritage Site Development

It was related to me stories including these incidents by Robert Lebegern, the museum’s director, who has dedicated much of his professional career developing it. Residents were asked at an early stage about how what length of structure they wanted to keep. They chose a stretch on the Bavarian perimeter, near where a villager succeeded to flee in the middle of the night with a scaling tool, subsequently the frontier was substantially reinforced.

Conserved Structures

A pair of observation towers are preserved together with a collection of tableaux depicting the most impactful dates in the community’s chronicle. As we move, the director lists the regulations: nobody could get closer than 5km of the frontier. Agricultural workers needed special permission to care for their crops; the spouse could use the harvesting machine but never both, for fear that they attempted to make a run for it. Armed guards were on duty.

Broader Context

The boundary between the Federal Republic and the East Germany stretched 1,400 kilometers, from the northern sea in the northern part to here in the southern region. Berlin is commemorated and honored the most frequently, but in excess of twice as many people (more than 300) were killed attempting to cross it in rural areas than in the metropolis. the director reminds me that 95 percent of attempts to flee were unsuccessful.

Village Life

Most of Mödlareuth’s residents were agricultural workers or skilled workers, who accommodated to dwelling in the grey zone between 2 political systems by avoiding attention and caring for their fields. They nor did they endorsed the East German authorities nor fought it, Robert Lebegern clarifies.

Tourism

For visitors, however, the village became a sort of pilgrimage. Roughly 15,000 came to visit annually, viewing tools in possession, to look – and then quickly go away. In 1983, the US president, George Bush, was guided by the national security head.

Twenty five years after unification, Tannbach, a television program about a imaginary village similar to Mödlareuth, caused fresh interest.

Modern Evolutions

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