Serious Difficulties in ‘Miniature Berlin’: The Tiny Hamlet Divided in Half by the Cold War
An creek so low you hardly got your feet wet divided a village for in excess of four decades worth of time. By an accident of topography, the fifty locals of Mödlareuth, a small village surrounded by evergreen groves, pastures and spectacular scenery, found themselves at the center of the cold war. They had the unfortunate circumstance to span Bavaria, in Western Germany, and Thuringia in the East, a frontier that was marked first by a enclosure and then by a partition. US troops called it Small Berlin.
Commemorating the Past
A few months after their own wall was torn down, and even before their nation had unified again in 1990, a collection of local people started documenting their heritage. The effort is about to reach completion: on 9 November, the 36th anniversary of the demolition of the German barrier, the Deutsch-Deutsches Museum Mödlareuth will open. It was officially launched by the head of state, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in early October, but the exhibition was not completely prepared. Telling the locals who endured the past era, Steinmeier said: “You were observers of an cruel division, which pulled households apart and turned local residents into aliens.”
“You were observers of an brutal division, which tore relatives into pieces and turned neighbours into aliens.”
Past Background
Even at its creation in 1810, the village straddled the Royal Bavaria and the Princely State of Reuss, a princely house best known for bestowing all its male descendants the title Heinrich and numbering them sequentially by birth. As Steinmeier related to the gathering, the quirk was never an obstacle in the way of the locals socializing in the same inn, visiting the very same church and sending their children to the identical learning center.
Following WWII Division
Next arrived the second world war. As soon as they appeared, the Soviet forces erected timber poles by the creek. For a year they occupied the whole village, creating their control center in a house on the Bavarian side, decorating it with a image of Stalin and a communist symbol. The Americans convinced them to retreat to the other side of the creek. For a while, locals could continue to hop over, though as controls increased they were forced to display ID, despite the fact that everyone understood who they were, and to return at night.
Increase of Border Measures
After that, in 1952, came wire fencing and the official closing of the border. In 1966, as in Berlin previously in 1961, a concrete structure was erected, with landmines, anti-tank obstacles and guard posts. The locals could still view each other by ascending slopes, but on the Soviet side gesturing and shouting were forbidden. A female resident was added to a GDR intelligence surveillance list for responding “same to you” to a West German resident who greeted her “happy new year”.
Museum Development
I heard accounts like these incidents by Robert Lebegern, the museum’s director, who has dedicated much of his occupational time creating it. Villagers were consulted early on about how much wall they wanted to preserve. They opted for a portion on the west edge, near where a local resident succeeded to escape in the middle of the night with a scaling tool, subsequently the frontier was heavily fortified.
Maintained Buildings
Two observation towers are conserved in addition to a collection of displays showing the most impactful dates in the community’s chronicle. As we move, Robert Lebegern details the rules: not a single person could get closer than 5km of the border. Farmers needed particular approval to tend to their produce; the partner could operate the agricultural equipment but under no circumstances the pair, lest they attempted to escape. Armed guards were on duty.
Broader Background
The frontier between Western Germany and the German Democratic Republic extended 1,400 kilometers, from the Baltic Sea in the northern part to here in the southern region. Berlin is remembered and memorialised the greatest, but more than two times more people (exceeding 300) were killed attempting to traverse it in rural areas than in the urban center. the director tells me that 95% of attempts to flee failed.
Hamlet Existence
Most of Mödlareuth’s villagers were farmers or skilled workers, who accommodated to residing in the grey zone between two belief systems by staying low-profile and caring for their land. They neither backed the socialist government nor opposed it, Lebegern explains.
Visitors
For visitors, however, the settlement became a type of site of interest. Roughly 15k came to see annually, binoculars in hand, to gawp – and then swiftly go away. In 1983, the United States leader, George Bush, was given a tour by the national security head.
25 years after reunification, the television series, a TV series about a imaginary hamlet resembling Mödlareuth, resulted in new interest.
Present-Day Changes
The inauguration of the new museum – with a coffee shop, shop, movie theater and sizable parking lot – is expected to
