Serious Difficulties in ‘Little Berlin’: The Tiny Village Divided in Two by the Cold War Period

A brook so low you scarcely got your feet wet separated a community for over four decades worth of time. Because of a chance of landscape, the 50 locals of Mödlareuth, a tiny settlement surrounded by pine forests, pastures and spectacular views, found themselves at the heart of the Cold War tensions. They had the bad luck to straddle the Bavarian region, in Western Germany, and the Thuringian region in the Soviet sector, a border that was demarcated first by a barrier and then by a wall. American soldiers dubbed it Small Berlin.

Memorialising Historical Events

Months after their own barrier was torn down, and before their country had become one in 1990, a collection of residents set about documenting their history. The effort is about 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 officially opened by the federal president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in early October, but the display was not completely ready. Telling the residents who experienced the old days, Steinmeier remarked: “You were bystanders of an inhuman separation, which pulled relatives apart and turned local residents into foreigners.”

“You were witnesses of an brutal split, which pulled households asunder and turned local residents into strangers.”

Bygone Origins

Even at its creation in 1810, the hamlet cut across the Kingdom of Bavaria and the Princely State of Reuss, a noble lineage most renowned for bestowing all its men the designation Heinrich and labeling them consecutively by birth order. As Steinmeier told the gathering, the peculiarity was never an obstacle in the path of the inhabitants drinking in the same tavern, attending the very same religious building and placing their young ones to the same educational institution.

Following WWII Separation

Subsequently occurred the World War II. As soon as they arrived, the Russian troops put up wooden posts by the brook. For a year they occupied the entire hamlet, setting up their command in a building on the Bavarian territory side, adorning it with a image of Stalin and a Soviet emblem. The American soldiers convinced them to pull back across the brook. For a while, locals could still cross over, though as limitations tightened they were obliged to present identification, although everyone understood who they were, and to come back at night.

Intensification of Frontier Measures

After that, in 1952, came barbed wire and the official closing of the border. In 1966, as in Berlin previously in 1961, a wall was built, with mines, tank traps and observation points. The locals could continue to view each other by scaling hills, but on the east side gesturing and yelling were banned. One woman was added to a Stasi monitoring list for answering “likewise” to a Bavarian local who wished her “good new year”.

Heritage Site Development

It was related to me accounts like these by Robert Lebegern, the director of the museum, who has dedicated a significant portion of his professional career building it. Residents were asked early on about how much structure they desired to maintain. They opted for a portion on the Bavarian fringe, close to where a local resident succeeded to escape in the darkest hours with a scaling tool, subsequently the border was significantly fortified.

Conserved Installations

A pair of guard towers are maintained alongside a series of exhibits illustrating the most impactful events in the village’s past. As we walk, Robert Lebegern details the rules: not a single person could approach 5km of the boundary. Rural residents had to obtain specific authorization to look after their produce; the husband or wife could use the combine harvester but not the pair, in case they attempted to flee. Military personnel stood watch.

Broader Perspective

The border between the Federal Republic and the German Democratic Republic stretched 1,400 kilometers, from the Baltic Sea in the north to here in the south. Berlin is remembered and documented the greatest, but over double the number individuals (well over 300) died trying to pass over it in provincial zones than in the urban center. Lebegern informs me that 95 percent of efforts to cross did not succeed.

Community Existence

Most of Mödlareuth’s villagers were agricultural workers or craftsmen, who adjusted to living in the grey zone between two belief systems by avoiding attention and tending to their farms. They neither supported the socialist government nor fought it, Robert Lebegern clarifies.

Tourism

For sightseers, however, the settlement became a sort of destination. Roughly 15k visited each year, optical devices in their hands, to look – and then swiftly go away. In 1983, the American president, George Bush, was given a tour by the national security head.

Twenty-five years after merger, the television series, a television program about a fictional village similar to Mödlareuth, resulted in fresh interest.

Present-Day Developments

The opening of the recently established museum – with a restaurant, store, cinema room and sizable car park – is probable to