🔗 Share this article

An brook so low you hardly got your feet wet divided a community for over four decades. By an accident of landscape, the 50 inhabitants of Mödlareuth, a tiny settlement encircled by evergreen groves, meadows and spectacular vistas, found themselves at the center of the Cold War conflict. They had the unfortunate circumstance to straddle the Bavarian region, in West Germany, and the Thuringian region in the Eastern part, a frontier that was established first by a enclosure and then by a barricade. American soldiers dubbed it Small Berlin.

Commemorating the Past

Months after their own barrier was breached, and before their nation had become one in 1990, a group of residents set about commemorating their heritage. The project is close to reach completion: on 9 November, the thirty-sixth anniversary of the fall of the Wall in Berlin, the German-German Museum Mödlareuth will begin operations. It was officially launched by the national president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in the first part of October, but the display was not entirely ready. Addressing the residents who lived through the old days, Steinmeier said: “You were observers of an cruel division, which tore households apart and turned neighbours into strangers.”

“You were observers of an brutal split, which tore families into pieces and turned neighbours into strangers.”

Historical Origins

Starting at its founding in 1810, the village cut across the Kingdom of Bavaria and the Principality of Reuss, a princely house best known for bestowing all its male members the name Heinrich and counting them sequentially by date of birth. As Steinmeier informed the gathering, the oddity did not stand in the way of the inhabitants socializing in the very same tavern, going to the very same religious building and sending their kids to the very same school.

Post-War Split

Then came the second world war. As soon as they came, the Russian troops installed wooden posts by the brook. For a year they took over the entire community, setting up their control center in a house on the western side, embellishing it with a portrait of Stalin and a red star. The Americans urged them to withdraw back over the brook. For a while, locals could still hop over, though as restrictions tightened they were required to show identification, despite the fact that all understood who they were, and to come back at night.

Intensification of Boundary Restrictions

Then, in 1952, came metal barriers and the formal shutting of the border. In 1966, as in Berlin previously in 1961, a barrier was built, with explosives, tank traps and guard posts. The villagers could still see each other by scaling elevations, but on the eastern side signaling and shouting were banned. One woman was put on a GDR intelligence watch list for answering “back at you” to a West German local who greeted her “prosperous new year”.

Heritage Site Creation

I heard narratives such as these by Robert Lebegern, the museum’s director, who has devoted much of his professional career developing it. Residents were consulted in the initial phases about how much barrier they wished to maintain. They opted for a portion on the west fringe, adjacent to where one of their own succeeded to escape in the middle of the night with a ladder, subsequently the border was substantially reinforced.

Maintained Structures

A pair of observation towers are conserved together with a set of exhibits depicting the most significant events in the community’s chronicle. As we stroll, Robert Lebegern lists the regulations: not a single person could get closer than 5km of the border. Agricultural workers had to obtain specific authorization to care for their crops; the spouse could operate the combine harvester but never the two, lest they sought to make a run for it. Armed guards were on duty.

Larger Perspective

The boundary between West Germany and the East Germany stretched 1,400 kilometers, from the northern sea in the north to here in the south. Berlin is recalled and honored the most frequently, but in excess of double the number people (well over 300) died attempting to pass over it in rural areas than in the metropolis. Robert Lebegern informs me that 95% of attempts to flee failed.

Village Daily Living

The majority of Mödlareuth’s residents were rural laborers or craftsmen, who adjusted to dwelling in the grey zone between 2 ideological spheres by staying low-profile and caring for their land. They nor did they backed the East German authorities nor opposed it, Robert Lebegern states.

Visitors

For tourists, however, the settlement became a type of site of interest. Roughly 15k visited annually, optical devices in their hands, to look – and then swiftly go away. In 1983, the US president, George Bush, was shown around by the national security head.

25 years after reunification, the TV show, a broadcast production about a made-up village like Mödlareuth, resulted in fresh interest.

Current Changes

The inauguration of the recently established museum – with a coffee shop, store, movie theater and sizable parking lot – is expected to