Major Trouble in ‘Little Berlin’: This Small Village Divided in Half by the Cold War

An brook so shallow you scarcely got your feet wet separated a village for over four decades. By an accident of landscape, the fifty locals of Mödlareuth, a tiny settlement bordered by coniferous woods, pastures and stunning views, found themselves at the core of the Cold War tensions. They had the misfortune to straddle the Bavarian region, in Western Germany, and the Thuringian region in the Soviet sector, a frontier that was marked first by a barrier and then by a barricade. American soldiers nicknamed it Small Berlin.

Commemorating Historical Events

Several months after their own division was torn down, and even before their nation had reunified in 1990, a collection of residents set about commemorating their history. The work is soon to come to fruition: on 9 November, the thirty-sixth remembrance of the fall of the Berlin Wall, the German-German Museum Mödlareuth will inaugurate. It was formally launched by the federal president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in early October, but the show wasn’t quite ready. Speaking to the locals who endured the past era, Steinmeier said: “You were bystanders of an brutal division, which ripped households asunder and turned neighbours into aliens.”

“You were witnesses of an brutal separation, which ripped relatives asunder and turned neighbors into strangers.”

Bygone Background

Starting at its establishment in 1810, the community straddled the Kingdom of Bavaria and the Principality of Reuss, a princely house most famous for bestowing all its men the name Heinrich and numbering them in order by date of birth. As Steinmeier related to the gathering, the oddity never stood in the path of the locals drinking in the identical tavern, going to the identical church and sending their young ones to the same learning center.

Post-War Separation

Subsequently occurred the World War II. The moment they appeared, the Soviet forces erected timber poles by the brook. For a twelve months they occupied the complete community, creating their command in a building on the Bavarian territory side, adorning it with a portrait of Stalin and a Soviet emblem. The American soldiers persuaded them to retreat across the brook. For a while, locals could continue to jump across, though as limitations became stricter they were forced to show ID, even though all knew who they were, and to come back at evening.

Escalation of Frontier Restrictions

Then, in 1952, came metal barriers and the formal shutting of the frontier. In 1966, as in Berlin half a decade before, a concrete structure was built, with landmines, anti-tank obstacles and guard posts. The residents could still observe each other by ascending elevations, but on the east side waving and shouting were prohibited. A female resident was put on a East German secret police watch list for replying “same to you” to a West German local who greeted her “happy new year”.

Exhibition Center Creation

I heard accounts including these incidents by Robert Lebegern, the head of the institution, who has devoted a large part of his working life developing it. Residents were consulted early on about how what length of barrier they wished to keep. They selected a portion on the western edge, close to where one of their own managed to escape in the middle of the night with a scaling tool, following which the boundary was significantly fortified.

Preserved Buildings

A pair of watchtowers are maintained together with a set of exhibits showing the most dramatic dates in the community’s history. As we walk, Robert Lebegern lists the regulations: nobody could approach 5km of the boundary. Rural residents required specific authorization to look after their fields; the husband or wife could operate the combine harvester but not the pair, for fear that they tried to escape. Soldiers stood watch.

Wider Perspective

The frontier between West Germany and the German Democratic Republic extended 1,400km, from the Baltic coast in the northern part to this location in the southern region. Berlin is recalled and documented the most frequently, but more than double the number people (exceeding 300) died attempting to cross it in rural areas than in the big city. Lebegern informs me that almost all of efforts to cross did not succeed.

Village Daily Living

Most of Mödlareuth’s residents were agricultural workers or craftsmen, who accommodated to living in the uncertain territory between a pair of belief systems by keeping their heads down and caring for their farms. They did not endorsed the East German authorities nor resisted it, the director states.

Tourism

For sightseers, however, the hamlet became a type of pilgrimage. About 15,000 came to visit every year, optical devices in their hands, to gawp – and then swiftly depart. In 1983, the American president, George Bush, was shown around by the German defence minister.

Twenty-five years after unification, the television series, a TV series about a imaginary village resembling Mödlareuth, led to renewed interest.

Modern Developments

The launch of the modern exhibition center – with a coffee shop, store, film screening area and sizable vehicle area – is expected to