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An stream so narrow you hardly got your feet wet separated a settlement for more than four decades. By an accident of topography, the fifty locals of Mödlareuth, a small village surrounded by pine forests, fields and spectacular views, found themselves at the core of the cold war. They had the bad luck to straddle Bavaria, in Western Germany, and Thuringia in the Eastern part, a border that was demarcated first by a barrier and then by a wall. US troops nicknamed it Small Berlin.

Commemorating the Past

Months after their own barrier was opened, and before their nation had reunified in 1990, a collection of local people started commemorating their past. The work is close to come to fruition: on 9 November, the 36th remembrance of the fall of the Berlin Wall, the Museum of German Division Mödlareuth will inaugurate. It was publicly launched by the federal president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in early October, but the exhibition was not entirely ready. Speaking to the residents who lived through the former times, Steinmeier stated: “You were bystanders of an inhuman split, which tore households asunder and turned local residents into aliens.”

“You were bystanders of an cruel division, which ripped relatives apart and turned neighbours into foreigners.”

Past Context

Even at its creation in 1810, the hamlet spanned the Royal Bavaria and the Princely State of Reuss, a princely house most renowned for giving all its male descendants the title Heinrich and labeling them consecutively by date of birth. As Steinmeier told the gathering, the peculiarity never stood in the way of the locals socializing in the same tavern, visiting the same church and placing their children to the very same school.

Post-War Division

Then came the global conflict. As soon as they came, the Soviet forces put up wood stakes by the creek. For a twelve months they occupied the entire village, setting up their headquarters in a building on the Bavarian side, adorning it with a image of Stalin and a communist symbol. The Americans convinced them to withdraw to the other side of the creek. For a while, villagers could continue to jump across, though as restrictions increased they were required to show identification, although all knew who they were, and to come back at evening.

Escalation of Border Controls

Subsequently, in 1952, came metal barriers and the official closing of the boundary. In 1966, as in Berlin five years earlier, a wall was built, with landmines, anti-tank obstacles and observation points. The locals could continue to view each other by ascending slopes, but on the Soviet side waving and calling out were prohibited. One woman was put on a Stasi watch list for responding “same to you” to a western local who said her “happy new year”.

Exhibition Center Creation

I heard narratives like these tales by Robert Lebegern, the director of the museum, who has dedicated a large part of his professional career developing it. Locals were asked at an early stage about how how long a section barrier they wanted to keep. They selected a section on the Bavarian fringe, close to where a local resident succeeded to escape in the darkest hours with a ladder, following which the frontier was heavily fortified.

Maintained Buildings

2 watchtowers are conserved together with a series of tableaux depicting the most impactful events in the hamlet’s history. As we stroll, the director enumerates the rules: no one could get closer than 5km of the boundary. Farmers needed particular approval to tend to their produce; the husband or wife could operate the harvesting machine but under no circumstances the two, lest they sought to make a run for it. Military personnel stood watch.

Broader Context

The border between Western Germany and the GDR extended 1,400 kilometers, from the Baltic coast in the northern part to here in the southern region. Berlin is recalled and documented the most, but in excess of double the number persons (exceeding 300) died seeking to traverse it in countryside regions than in the metropolis. Robert Lebegern tells me that 95 percent of escape attempts failed.

Community Daily Living

The majority of Mödlareuth’s residents were farmers or artisans, who adapted to dwelling in the grey zone between a pair of political systems by staying low-profile and tending to their fields. They nor did they supported the East German authorities nor opposed it, the director clarifies.

Visitors

For tourists, however, the hamlet became a kind of pilgrimage. About fifteen thousand came to see each year, viewing tools in hand, to stare – and then swiftly go away. In 1983, the United States leader, George Bush, was given a tour by the German defense official.

25 years after unification, the TV show, a television program about a made-up hamlet similar to Mödlareuth, resulted in new attention.

Current Changes

The opening of the recently established museum – with a restaurant, shop, cinema room and sizable parking lot – is likely to