Today, unemployment is a major factor in many cities in the Ruhr area. "No other industries were receiving that kind of backing." People wondered why they were being forced to support mining, Klammer says. To help prop up mining, Germans at the time paid a so-called "coal penny" with every electricity bill.
"That's when we started working reduced hours," he remembers, adding that was when the image of mining dropped, too. The demise of the mine had already started when Gerhard Klammer took up coal mining in 1959. Strikes in France and demonstrations in Germany would contribute to stretching the farewell to hard coal over another 60 years. That included the period in the late 1950s, when hard coal mines were on their way out again and the state had to subsidize mining. When the ECSC was founded, allowances were made for the coal miners' participation. Via unions, they were fully involved in decision-making processes. But they still settled here, and some even founded their own organizations," Heimsoth explains.Ĭoal miners were in demand, and that boosted their self-confidence. "For a long time, the Ruhr Poles were hated. Still, work in the mines did help speed up the integration process. He adds that, even though the Ruhr region prided itself in its people's solidarity with the pit workers, a lot of immigrant miners had to deal with rejection and aggression on a daily basis. "It was important to us to show in this exhibition that, across Europe, 100,000 people resettled, had to be integrated, put down roots," Heimsoth says. First, workers were sought in neighboring European countries then mines began recruiting further afield, in Turkey and African countries. Promotional posters from various European countries show how extra rations and generous remuneration were used to tempt people down the pits.
Heimsoth refers to it as a "coal drought." As the demand for coal grew, so did the demand for miners. The forming of this union was the first step on the road towards the European Economic Community, which would later evolve into the European Union.Īfter the Second World War, the demand for coal was enormous. The signatories had all been affected by the Second World War and agreed that coal and steel should never again be used to wage war. Read more: The battle for villages and forests in Germany's coal countryĪn important political document is also on display in the "Age of Coal" exhibition: the original contract for the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC) - the union formed by France, Italy, West Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg in 1951. Synthetically obtained extracts from hard coal tar, a byproduct of coal burning, are also used in the plastics and pharmaceutical industries. It is not just useful as an energy source or in steel production it also has a chemical use, because synthetic dyes can be made from coal. Or there is the collection of little glass bottles filled with liquids in all colors that speak to coal's versatility. Soup was poured down the hole, and he collected it in his shoe. The miner was trapped in the pit, with only a small hole connecting him to the world above ground.
For example, there is the boot that helped save a miner's life back in 1930.