Serious Problems in ‘Miniature Berlin’: This Minuscule Village Separated in Half by the Cold War
A creek so narrow you hardly got your feet wet separated a village for more than four decades. Because of a chance of topography, the 50 inhabitants of Mödlareuth, a tiny settlement bordered by coniferous woods, meadows and stunning views, found themselves at the core of the cold war. They had the misfortune to span the Bavarian region, in West Germany, and the Thuringian region in the Eastern part, a boundary that was marked first by a fence and then by a wall. United States military personnel dubbed it Small Berlin.
Memorialising History
Several months after their own wall was torn down, and even before their country had unified again in 1990, a collection of residents started commemorating their past. The work is close to come to fruition: on 9 November, the 36th remembrance of the demolition of the Wall in Berlin, the Museum of German Division Mödlareuth will begin operations. It was publicly launched by the national president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in the first part of October, but the exhibition was not completely ready. Addressing the villagers who endured the former times, Steinmeier stated: “You were observers of an cruel separation, which pulled families apart and turned neighbors into strangers.”
“You were bystanders of an brutal split, which ripped relatives asunder and turned neighbors into foreigners.”
Historical Background
Right from its founding in 1810, the community cut across the Kingdom of Bavaria and the Princely State of Reuss, a princely house most famous for bestowing all its men the name Heinrich and counting them consecutively by birth order. As Steinmeier informed the gathering, the quirk was never an obstacle in the way of the locals gathering in the identical tavern, going to the identical place of worship and sending their children to the identical school.
After the War Separation
Subsequently occurred the second world war. The moment they appeared, the Russian troops installed wooden posts by the creek. For a annual period they seized the complete hamlet, establishing their command in a building on the western side, adorning it with a picture of Stalin and a red star. The Americans persuaded them to withdraw back over the brook. For a period, residents could still hop over, though as controls tightened they were obliged to show identification, even though each person understood who they were, and to return at evening.
Escalation of Border Controls
Subsequently, in 1952, came barbed wire and the legal shutting of the boundary. In 1966, as in Berlin previously in 1961, a concrete structure was erected, with landmines, vehicle barriers and guard posts. The villagers could still view each other by ascending elevations, but on the Soviet side gesturing and calling out were forbidden. A local woman was placed on a East German secret police monitoring list for responding “back at you” to a Bavarian resident who wished her “happy new year”.
Museum Creation
I was told accounts such as these tales by Robert Lebegern, the director of the museum, who has spent a large part of his professional career building it. Residents were consulted at an early stage about how what length of structure they wanted to preserve. They chose a portion on the west fringe, near where one of their own succeeded to get away in the darkest hours with a ladder, following which the boundary was significantly strengthened.
Maintained Structures
A pair of watchtowers are conserved together with a series of tableaux depicting the most dramatic moments in the community’s chronicle. As we walk, the director enumerates the rules: nobody could approach 5km of the boundary. Farmers had to obtain specific authorization to look after their produce; the husband or wife could operate the combine harvester but not the pair, for fear that they attempted to flee. Armed guards were on duty.
Broader Background
The boundary between the Federal Republic and the GDR extended 1,400km, from the Baltic Sea in the north to the south in the south. Berlin is recalled and documented the most, but over double the number people (well over 300) were killed trying to cross it in rural areas than in the urban center. Lebegern reminds me that 95 percent of attempts to flee failed.
Village Life
Most of Mödlareuth’s locals were agricultural workers or skilled workers, who adapted to dwelling in the grey zone between 2 belief systems by staying low-profile and looking after their land. They neither endorsed the communist regime nor fought it, Lebegern explains.
Tourism
For tourists, however, the settlement became a type of site of interest. Roughly 15k came to visit annually, viewing tools in possession, to look – and then quickly depart. In 1983, the United States leader, George Bush, was given a tour by the national security head.
Twenty five years after unification, Tannbach, a TV series about a imaginary village similar to Mödlareuth, caused fresh curiosity.
Current Changes
The launch of the new museum – with a cafe, boutique, film screening area and sizable car park – is probable to
