Big Problems in ‘Little Berlin’: The Tiny Hamlet Divided in Two by the Cold War

An brook so low you hardly got your ankles wet split a community for more than four decades worth of time. By an accident of geography, the 50 residents of Mödlareuth, a tiny settlement encircled by coniferous woods, meadows and spectacular vistas, found themselves at the heart of the Cold War conflict. They had the bad luck to span the Bavarian region, in West Germany, and the Thuringian region in the Soviet sector, a border that was demarcated first by a barrier and then by a partition. American soldiers called it Mini Berlin.

Commemorating History

Several months after their own barrier was opened, and even before their state had reunified in 1990, a group of local people set about memorialising their history. The work is close to be completed: on 9 November, the 36th remembrance of the demolition of the Wall in Berlin, the German-German Museum Mödlareuth will open. It was publicly opened by the national president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in early October, but the show wasn’t quite prepared. Telling the villagers who lived through the past era, Steinmeier remarked: “You were observers of an cruel split, which pulled households into pieces and turned neighbours into strangers.”

“You were observers of an brutal division, which pulled households apart and turned neighbors into foreigners.”

Bygone Origins

Right from its founding in 1810, the community spanned the Bavarian Kingdom and the Princely State of Reuss, a noble lineage most famous for giving all its male members the designation Heinrich and counting them sequentially by birth. As Steinmeier informed the crowd, the peculiarity never stood in the path of the locals drinking in the identical tavern, attending the same religious building and placing their young ones to the same educational institution.

After the War Split

Next arrived the second world war. Immediately after they arrived, the Russian troops put up wooden posts by the creek. For a year they occupied the entire village, establishing their control center in a building on the western side, adorning it with a picture of Stalin and a communist symbol. The US forces urged them to retreat to the other side of the creek. For a time, residents could continue to jump across, though as controls increased they were required to show identification, even though all knew who they were, and to go back at night.

Escalation of Boundary Controls

After that, in 1952, came wire fencing and the formal closing of the frontier. In 1966, as in Berlin half a decade before, a wall was built, with landmines, anti-tank obstacles and watchtowers. The villagers could still see each other by ascending slopes, but on the Soviet side waving and yelling were forbidden. One woman was placed on a GDR intelligence monitoring list for replying “back at you” to a Bavarian resident who wished her “happy new year”.

Museum Establishment

I heard accounts such as these by Robert Lebegern, the head of the institution, who has devoted a large part of his occupational time building it. Residents were asked at an early stage about how how long a section wall they wanted to preserve. They selected a section on the Bavarian perimeter, adjacent to where a villager managed to escape in the dead of night with a scaling tool, subsequently the frontier was heavily fortified.

Conserved Installations

Two observation towers are conserved in addition to a set of exhibits illustrating the most dramatic events in the village’s history. As we stroll, the director lists the rules: nobody could come within 5km of the frontier. Farmers required specific authorization to tend to their crops; the partner could use the agricultural equipment but never the pair, lest they sought to escape. Military personnel stood watch.

Wider Background

The frontier between West Germany and the GDR extended 1,400 kilometers, from the Baltic Sea in the northern part to the south in the southern region. Berlin is commemorated and memorialised the most, but more than double the number persons (exceeding 300) were killed attempting to pass over it in provincial zones than in the big city. Robert Lebegern informs me that almost all of efforts to cross were unsuccessful.

Community Existence

The majority of Mödlareuth’s locals were farmers or craftsmen, who adjusted to residing in the grey zone between two belief systems by staying low-profile and looking after their land. They nor did they supported the socialist government nor fought it, the director states.

Visitors

For sightseers, however, the hamlet became a type of site of interest. Approximately 15,000 came to see annually, viewing tools in their hands, to stare – and then rapidly depart. In 1983, the United States leader, George Bush, was guided by the German defence minister.

Twenty five years after unification, the TV show, a TV series about a fictional hamlet like Mödlareuth, caused new attention.

Current Developments

The opening of the modern exhibition center – with a restaurant, shop, film screening area and sizable parking lot – is likely to