Major Difficulties in ‘Miniature Berlin’: This Tiny Hamlet Divided in Two by the Cold War Period

An creek so shallow you barely got your ankles wet divided a settlement for over four decades. Due to a quirk of topography, the 50 locals of Mödlareuth, a tiny settlement encircled by pine forests, pastures and stunning vistas, found themselves at the core of the Cold War tensions. They had the misfortune to straddle Bavaria, in the Federal Republic of Germany, and Thuringia in the Eastern part, a frontier that was marked first by a enclosure and then by a wall. United States military personnel nicknamed it Mini Berlin.

Commemorating the Past

Several months after their own division was breached, and prior to their state had unified again in 1990, a collection of residents started memorialising their heritage. The work is soon to be completed: on 9 November, the 36th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, the Museum of German Division Mödlareuth will open. It was publicly inaugurated by the national president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in the beginning of October, but the show was not completely prepared. Speaking to the residents who experienced the former times, Steinmeier stated: “You were witnesses of an cruel separation, which ripped relatives asunder and turned neighbours into aliens.”

“You were witnesses of an inhuman split, which pulled families into pieces and turned neighbors into aliens.”

Historical Context

Right from its founding in 1810, the hamlet spanned the Kingdom of Bavaria and the Princely State of Reuss, a noble lineage most renowned for assigning all its men the name Heinrich and counting them sequentially by birth order. As Steinmeier told the audience, the oddity was never an obstacle in the way of the inhabitants socializing in the identical tavern, visiting the identical religious building and placing their kids to the very same learning center.

Post-War Division

Next arrived the World War II. As soon as they came, the Russian troops erected wooden posts by the creek. For a year they took over the complete community, establishing their headquarters in a building on the Bavarian territory side, embellishing it with a image of Stalin and a Soviet emblem. The Americans urged them to withdraw to the other side of the brook. For a time, villagers could still hop over, though as limitations increased they were obliged to display identity papers, despite the fact that everyone was aware who they were, and to come back at night.

Escalation of Border Measures

Then, in 1952, came barbed wire and the legal shutting of the frontier. In 1966, as in Berlin half a decade before, a barrier was built, with explosives, tank traps and observation points. The villagers could still observe each other by ascending elevations, but on the Soviet side gesturing and shouting were banned. A female resident was put on a East German secret police surveillance list for responding “back at you” to a West German local who said her “prosperous new year”.

Heritage Site Development

I heard narratives such as these incidents by Robert Lebegern, the director of the museum, who has dedicated a large part of his professional career building it. Residents were consulted early on about how much wall they wished to preserve. They chose a stretch on the western edge, near where one of their own managed to get away in the darkest hours with a climbing device, subsequently the border was significantly reinforced.

Preserved Buildings

A pair of guard towers are maintained in addition to a series of exhibits showing the most impactful events in the hamlet’s history. As we walk, the director enumerates the rules: nobody could approach 5km of the frontier. Agricultural workers required special permission to tend to their produce; the husband or wife could use the harvesting machine but never both, for fear that they tried to escape. Armed guards kept guard.

Larger Context

The frontier between Western Germany and the GDR extended 1,400 kilometers, from the northern sea in the northern part to the south in the south. Berlin is commemorated and documented the greatest, but over two times more persons (exceeding 300) were killed seeking to traverse it in rural areas than in the big city. Lebegern informs me that 95% of efforts to cross did not succeed.

Village Life

The greater part of Mödlareuth’s residents were agricultural workers or artisans, who adapted to residing in the grey zone between 2 belief systems by avoiding attention and caring for their farms. They nor did they backed the socialist government nor fought it, Lebegern clarifies.

Tourism

For sightseers, however, the hamlet became a sort of destination. Roughly 15k came to see annually, binoculars in their hands, to gawp – and then quickly leave. In 1983, the US president, George Bush, was given a tour by the national security head.

Twenty-five years after reunification, Tannbach, a broadcast production about a imaginary hamlet resembling Mödlareuth, caused fresh attention.

Current Developments

The opening of the recently established museum – with a cafe, shop, cinema room and big car park – is expected to