🔗 Share this article

A creek so shallow you hardly got your ankles wet separated a community for more than four decades of time. Because of a chance of landscape, the fifty inhabitants of Mödlareuth, a hamlet surrounded by pine forests, fields and stunning scenery, found themselves at the heart of the Cold War conflict. They had the unfortunate circumstance to cross Bavaria, in the Federal Republic of Germany, and the Thuringian region in the Soviet sector, a frontier that was marked first by a enclosure and then by a barricade. US troops dubbed it Small Berlin.

Preserving Historical Events

Months after their own barrier was torn down, and before their nation had become one in 1990, a group of local people set about documenting their heritage. The project is close to reach completion: on 9 November, the 36th anniversary of the collapse of the German barrier, the German-German Museum Mödlareuth will inaugurate. It was formally launched by the head of state, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in early October, but the exhibition was not completely prepared. Speaking to the residents who experienced the old days, Steinmeier remarked: “You were observers of an cruel separation, which pulled relatives into pieces and turned neighbours into foreigners.”

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

Past Context

Right from its creation in 1810, the community cut across the Kingdom of Bavaria and the Reuss Principality, a princely house most famous for giving all its men the title Heinrich and labeling them sequentially by birth. As Steinmeier related to the audience, the peculiarity never stood in the way of the inhabitants drinking in the same pub, visiting the same place of worship and enrolling their young ones to the very same school.

Following WWII Separation

Subsequently occurred the global conflict. The moment they appeared, the Russians put up timber poles by the stream. For a year they took over the whole village, establishing their headquarters in a dwelling on the Bavarian territory side, embellishing it with a portrait of Stalin and a communist symbol. The US forces convinced them to retreat to the other side of the brook. For a while, residents could still jump across, though as limitations tightened they were forced to display ID, even though everyone knew who they were, and to go back at after dark.

Increase of Boundary Measures

After that, in 1952, came wire fencing and the formal sealing of the frontier. In 1966, as in Berlin previously in 1961, a wall was constructed, with explosives, tank traps and guard posts. The villagers could still see each other by scaling hills, but on the Soviet side gesturing and shouting were forbidden. One woman was added to a GDR intelligence surveillance list for answering “likewise” to a western resident who said her “prosperous new year”.

Museum Establishment

I heard narratives like these tales by Robert Lebegern, the head of the institution, who has spent a large part of his occupational time creating it. Locals were asked in the initial phases about how what length of wall they wished to maintain. They opted for a section on the west perimeter, adjacent to where one of their own succeeded to get away in the middle of the night with a scaling tool, after which the border was substantially reinforced.

Preserved Structures

2 guard towers are preserved in addition to a series of displays depicting the most dramatic events in the hamlet’s past. As we move, Lebergen details the restrictions: nobody could approach 5km of the boundary. Rural residents required special permission to look after their fields; the spouse could operate the agricultural equipment but under no circumstances both, for fear that they attempted to make a run for it. Military personnel kept guard.

Wider Context

The frontier between Western Germany and the GDR ran 1,400 kilometers, from the Baltic coast in the north to the south in the south. Berlin is remembered and memorialised the greatest, but over twice as many people (well over 300) lost their lives trying to traverse it in countryside regions than in the metropolis. Robert Lebegern tells me that 95 percent of efforts to cross were unsuccessful.

Village Daily Living

The majority of Mödlareuth’s locals were rural laborers or craftsmen, who accommodated to living in the grey zone between 2 political systems by staying low-profile and caring for their farms. They nor did they endorsed the East German authorities nor fought it, Robert Lebegern clarifies.

Visitors

For sightseers, however, the village became a type of destination. Roughly 15k came to visit each year, optical devices in hand, to look – and then swiftly depart. In 1983, the United States leader, George Bush, was guided by the national security head.

Twenty five years after merger, the television series, a broadcast production about a fictional community similar to Mödlareuth, caused fresh attention.

Current Changes

The launch of the recently established museum – with a cafe, store, film screening area and large parking lot – is probable to