Big Problems in ‘Tiny Berlin’: This Tiny Village Split in Two by the Cold War Era
An brook so narrow you hardly got your ankles wet split a settlement for in excess of four decades worth of time. By an accident of topography, the half a hundred locals of Mödlareuth, a small village surrounded by pine forests, meadows and spectacular scenery, found themselves at the heart of the Cold War tensions. They had the bad luck to straddle the Bavarian region, in the Federal Republic of Germany, and the Thuringian region in the Soviet sector, a frontier that was marked first by a fence and then by a barricade. American soldiers nicknamed it Mini Berlin.
Preserving Historical Events
Several months after their own division was opened, and even before their state had unified again in 1990, a collection of residents set about memorialising their heritage. The project is soon to be completed: on 9 November, the 36th annual remembrance of the collapse of the German barrier, the Deutsch-Deutsches Museum Mödlareuth will open. It was formally inaugurated by the federal president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in the first part of October, but the show wasn’t quite prepared. Speaking to the villagers who endured the former times, Steinmeier stated: “You were witnesses of an inhuman division, which pulled relatives apart and turned neighbours into strangers.”
“You were witnesses of an inhuman division, which tore households asunder and turned local residents into strangers.”
Historical Origins
Even at its founding in 1810, the hamlet cut across the Kingdom of Bavaria and the Principality of Reuss, a noble lineage most famous for giving all its male descendants the name Heinrich and counting them consecutively by birth. As Steinmeier told the crowd, the peculiarity was never an obstacle in the way of the inhabitants socializing in the very same inn, attending the identical religious building and enrolling their young ones to the identical learning center.
Following WWII Division
Subsequently occurred the global conflict. As soon as they appeared, the Soviet forces installed wooden posts by the stream. For a twelve months they seized the entire village, setting up their headquarters in a dwelling on the Bavarian side, embellishing it with a picture of Stalin and a Soviet emblem. The Americans convinced them to withdraw back over the creek. For a period, residents could continue to hop over, though as limitations tightened they were required to present identity papers, despite the fact that everyone was aware who they were, and to go back at after dark.
Intensification of Border Controls
After that, in 1952, came metal barriers and the official closing of the border. In 1966, as in Berlin five years earlier, a barrier was built, with explosives, anti-tank obstacles and guard posts. The locals could still view each other by climbing slopes, but on the Soviet side signaling and shouting were prohibited. A female resident was put on a East German secret police watch list for responding “likewise” to a Bavarian resident who said her “prosperous new year”.
Heritage Site Development
I was told stories including these tales by Robert Lebegern, the head of the institution, who has devoted a large part of his working life building it. Villagers were consulted early on about how what length of structure they desired to keep. They opted for a portion on the west fringe, adjacent to where one of their own managed to get away in the middle of the night with a climbing device, following which the border was substantially strengthened.
Conserved Installations
A pair of observation towers are conserved alongside a set of displays showing the most impactful events in the village’s chronicle. As we walk, the director enumerates the regulations: not a single person could get closer than 5km of the boundary. Agricultural workers required specific authorization to look after their crops; the partner could work the combine harvester but under no circumstances both, in case they attempted to make a run for it. Soldiers stood watch.
Wider Background
The boundary between West Germany and the GDR ran 1,400km, from the Baltic Sea in the north to this location in the southern region. Berlin is recalled and documented the most, but more than twice as many persons (more than 300) died seeking to traverse it in countryside regions than in the metropolis. Lebegern tells me that 95% of attempts to flee failed.
Village Life
The majority of Mödlareuth’s residents were rural laborers or skilled workers, who accommodated to dwelling in the grey zone between a pair of ideological spheres by keeping their heads down and looking after their farms. They neither supported the socialist government nor fought it, Lebegern clarifies.
Visitors
For visitors, however, the hamlet became a type of pilgrimage. Approximately fifteen thousand came to visit every year, viewing tools in hand, to gawp – and then rapidly depart. In 1983, the United States leader, George Bush, was given a tour by the German defence minister.
Twenty-five years after reunification, Tannbach, a TV series about a made-up hamlet resembling Mödlareuth, resulted in new interest.
Modern Changes
The launch of the recently established museum – with a restaurant, boutique, cinema room and large parking lot – is likely to
