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A stream so shallow you scarcely got your ankles wet separated a settlement for more than four decades of time. By an accident of landscape, the half a hundred inhabitants of Mödlareuth, a tiny settlement encircled by evergreen groves, pastures and spectacular views, found themselves at the core of the Cold War conflict. They had the misfortune to span Bavaria, in Western Germany, and Thuringia in the East, a boundary that was marked first by a enclosure and then by a wall. American soldiers nicknamed it Mini Berlin.

Commemorating Historical Events

A few months after their own wall was breached, and prior to their state had reunified in 1990, a assembly of villagers started documenting their past. The work is soon to reach completion: on 9 November, the thirty-sixth remembrance of the collapse of the German barrier, the Deutsch-Deutsches Museum Mödlareuth will open. It was officially launched by the national president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in early October, but the show was not entirely finished. Addressing the locals who endured the old days, Steinmeier stated: “You were observers of an inhuman division, which ripped households asunder and turned neighbours into foreigners.”

“You were bystanders of an inhuman split, which pulled households apart and turned local residents into strangers.”

Historical Background

Right from its establishment in 1810, the community spanned the Kingdom of Bavaria and the Principality of Reuss, a royal family most renowned for bestowing all its male members the title Heinrich and labeling them consecutively by date of birth. As Steinmeier informed the gathering, the oddity did not stand in the manner of the inhabitants gathering in the same pub, going to the identical place of worship and placing their kids to the identical learning center.

Following WWII Separation

Then came the second world war. As soon as they arrived, the Soviet forces installed wooden posts by the creek. For a annual period they seized the whole village, establishing their control center in a dwelling on the Bavarian territory side, adorning it with a picture of Stalin and a red star. The US forces convinced them to retreat back over the creek. For a period, residents could still hop over, though as restrictions increased they were forced to show ID, although all was aware who they were, and to come back at night.

Increase of Border Controls

Then, in 1952, came metal barriers and the legal closing of the border. In 1966, as in Berlin half a decade before, a concrete structure was built, with mines, vehicle barriers and guard posts. The villagers could still observe each other by scaling elevations, but on the Soviet side waving and shouting were forbidden. A female resident was added to a Stasi surveillance list for responding “likewise” to a western resident who wished her “happy new year”.

Museum Establishment

I was told narratives like these incidents by Robert Lebegern, the director of the museum, who has dedicated a significant portion of his professional career developing it. Villagers were polled in the initial phases about how much barrier they desired to keep. They opted for a section on the Bavarian edge, close to where a villager managed to escape in the dead of night with a ladder, following which the boundary was substantially fortified.

Maintained Installations

Two guard towers are maintained in addition to a set of tableaux depicting the most impactful events in the village’s chronicle. As we move, Robert Lebegern details the rules: not a single person could approach 5km of the border. Farmers had to obtain special permission to care for their produce; the husband or wife could work the combine harvester but never the two, in case they attempted to make a run for it. Armed guards stood watch.

Broader Context

The frontier between the Federal Republic and the GDR ran 1,400 kilometers, from the Baltic Sea in the north to this location in the southern region. Berlin is remembered and honored the most, but in excess of twice as many persons (more than 300) lost their lives trying to cross it in rural areas than in the urban center. Lebegern informs me that almost all of escape attempts were unsuccessful.

Community Life

The greater part of Mödlareuth’s villagers were farmers or artisans, who adjusted to living in the uncertain territory between two belief systems by avoiding attention and tending to their fields. They did not backed the socialist government nor fought it, the director explains.

Tourism

For tourists, however, the settlement became a sort of pilgrimage. Roughly 15,000 visited annually, binoculars in possession, to gawp – and then rapidly depart. In 1983, the United States leader, George Bush, was guided by the German defence minister.

25 years after merger, the TV show, a TV series about a imaginary hamlet resembling Mödlareuth, caused new attention.

Current Changes

The opening of the recently established museum – with a restaurant, boutique, film screening area and big vehicle area – is expected to