Harlander Coats
| Harlander Coats
|
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|---|---|
 |
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| legal form | GmbH |
| founding | 1859 |
| resolution | 1991 |
| Reason for dissolution | Savings measures |
| Seat | Harland |
| Number of employees | maximum 1,400 |
| Branch | Twist production |
Harlander Coats was a cotton spinning and twisting mill with its headquarters in the Harland district of the Lower Austrian capital St. Pölten . Usually simply called the Harlanders in the population , the company previously operated as Mathias Salcher & Sons and Harlander cotton spinning and twisting factory AG St. Pölten-Harland . The company founded by Mathias Salcher in 1859 was best known for its iron yarn . In the early days, the factory was formative for Harland and the surrounding towns. Before the plant was closed in 1991, 1,400 people were employed at times.
history
History until 1914
Mathias Salcher senior , a trained weaver, founded a company in Vienna in 1828 that manufactured ribbons and braids . In 1858 he acquired a sawmill for veneers in Harland from Friedrich Blödtl , which he expanded with the property opposite to become an iron yarn factory until 1859. To this end, he founded Mathias Salcher & Sons with his four sons . Josef Salcher senior was the manager of this factory . The Lower Austrian Trade Association awarded them the silver medal for the introduction of iron yarn in Austria in 1863, and in 1873 the factory was named a privilege factory and the Lower Austrian Trade Association was awarded the gold medal.
| Employee |
year |
|---|---|
| 508 | 1878 |
| 1,000 | 1890 |
| 1,050 | 1915 |
| 1,400 | 1918 |
| 820 | 1937 |
| 1,100 | 1948 |
| 963 | 1958 |
| 550 | 1974 |
| 400 | 1986 |
| 200 | 1991 |
In Wagstadt ( Austrian Silesia ) they opened a button factory with an attached weaving mill in 1865. In the years between 1870 and 1890 the company acquired all mills and water rights on the eastern mill streams of the Traisen between Wilhelmsburg and the Lilienhof in neighboring Stattersdorf in order to increase production capacities. In 1875 the family bought the former Stattersdorfer screw factory and set up a winding shop there. For the same reason, the company set up the Theresienhof twisting mill the following year, named after the wife of the company founder. In 1879 a bobbin turning shop opened in Stattersdorf. The threads and threads should be made ready for dispatch in our own factory. That is why a number of subsidiary companies were created in the area of the main plant. The glossy shop was opened in 1861, the bleaching shop in 1870. In 1880 a cardboard department, a label printing shop and a dye works followed. After Mathias Salcher's death in 1879, his son Rudolf Salcher took over management of the company, Josef Salcher junior took over management of the company in 1889 and had the Georg spinning mill built in Ochsenburg , south of Harland, in 1892 .
In 1894 the company was on the verge of bankruptcy, the main reason being the drop in prices due to cheaper competition from England and Germany . Since the financial reserves were tied up by the construction of the Georg spinning mill, Josef jun. in January of the year the Aktiengesellschaft AG of the kk priv. Harlander cotton spinning and twisting factory . This enabled him to let new capital flow into the company, which was mainly owned by the main shareholder Kenneth Mackenzie Clark and his company J. & P. Coats Ltd. came from the Scottish paisley . Josef jun. became chairman of the board, his brother Carl board member.
After the turn of the century, Salcher had the factory in Ochsenburg, in particular, massively expanded in addition to some mill streams and hydroelectric power plants. Where the factory started with 1,200 spindles in 1892 , the workers were already using 28,000 in 1909. In 1913, the twisting mill in Brunn was the last major building in the company's history. Although the first waterwheels were replaced by turbines as early as 1883 , all plants were fully electrified only with the construction of the Theresienhof power plant.
World Wars and Post-War Period
On November 22, 1914, Oskar Rosenberg, a supervisory commissioner, took over the management of the company, and the factories were placed under state supervision because of their partly Scottish owners. In the first years of the First World War , a strong upswing could be felt, at the beginning of 1918 the company reached the highest number of employees with 1,400. In the months that followed, fewer and fewer raw materials, especially cotton, came to Harland. Since most of the remaining male workers went to war, production came to a complete standstill towards the end of the war. After Rosenberg ended state supervision on June 20, 1919 and handed the management back to Josef Salcher, production was resumed in a restricted form in 1920. In the same year, Josef closed production in Stattersdorf and had the building converted into workers' apartments. After the death of Joseph in 1920 the retired Family Salcher 1923 completely from the company and sold the remaining shares to the former majority owner J. & P. Coats Ltd .
After the "Anschluss" of Austria, Hubert Graf von Hardegg took over the management of the company in 1940, the company was placed under Nazi administration as "hostile property" and renamed Harlander cotton spinning and twisting factory AG St. Pölten-Harland . Towards the beginning of the war, the workers were almost unable to cope with the orders from the Wehrmacht, although von Hardegg had increased working hours from 48 to 54 hours. He tried to compensate for the labor shortage primarily with women and Ukrainian workers, and later with Soviet prisoners of war . When the war was coming to an end, the company suffered the same fate as in the previous war; a shortage of raw materials increasingly restricted production. As the operating facilities survived the bombardment almost undamaged and the Russian occupiers transferred the company to J. & P. Coats Ltd. relatively soon. returned, production could be resumed in August 1945.
The company's former authorized signatory, Karl Atzinger, took over commercial management in 1945, and James Bale Lamb became general director. In the winter of 1946/1947 production had to be temporarily stopped due to a lack of coal . In the years that followed, Atzinger had the systems modernized on an ongoing basis; in the early 1960s, automation found more and more use in the factories. After the transformation into a limited liability company , the company was called Harlander Coats GmbH . The director Walter Aicher, appointed in 1970, initially continued the modernization work that had begun, but after 1970 the textile industry and with it the twisting and yarn industry changed significantly . The parent company laid off more and more workers to continue production in low-wage countries . After J. & P. Coats Ltd. the main plant in Harland closed in 1987, they relocated the company headquarters to the Ochsenburg plant. It was the last to close on June 30, 1991.
The former factory buildings have different uses today. While the factory site in Ochsenburg was razed in May 2007 , there are still apartments in the Stattersdorf factory and in parts of the Harlander factory and the residential buildings. Contrary to the original plans of the city of St. Pölten to sell the Harland plant to Renault or Steyr in 1987 , the rest of the plant was sold to the Wallner Holz company, which has a warehouse there. The Starzengruber company bought the print shop and still operates it today. The EVN took over the small power plants, all of which are still in operation.
Name and owner of the Harlander Coats
The Harlander Coats have had several owners in their 134-year history. Simply called the Harlanders in the population , the official name has changed several times over the years, mostly due to a change of ownership. The following table lists the owners and names.
| Period | Surname | owner |
|---|---|---|
| 1859-1894 | Mathias Salcher & Sons | Salcher family |
| 1894-1920 | AG of the kk priv. Harland cotton spinning and twisting factory | Josef and Carl Salcher, KM Clark, Franz Richter |
| 1920-1923 | AG of the Harland cotton spinning and twisting factory | Josef and Carl Salcher, KM Clark, Franz Richter |
| 1923-1940 | AG of the Harland cotton spinning and twisting factory | J. & P. Coats Ltd. |
| 1940-1945 | Harland cotton spinning and twisting factory AG St. Pölten-Harland | German Empire |
| 1945–1968 | Harland cotton spinning and twisting factory AG St. Pölten-Harland | J. & P. Coats Ltd. |
| 1968-1991 | Harlander Coats GmbH | J. & P. Coats Ltd. |
Production and Products
The Harlander Coats produced all kinds of yarns and twisted yarns of cotton. A particular specialty was the production of “iron yarn”, a yarn that is particularly shiny and tear-resistant thanks to multiple twisting and treatment with paraffin and wax .
The first Salcher products were sold under the brand names Gemse , Schwan , Schmetterling , Löwe and Libra . The packaging had an emblem of St. George . In 1884 the brand names Tref , Karo , Pik and Herz were also introduced. When the company became English owned, the brand names were standardized. The most well-known products were the needlework thread anchors , the darning thread Karo , the sewing thread chain and the sewing machine thread chamois .
Production was always the same. A thread was made from the cotton in the spinning mill . After the raw cotton was mixed to obtain a uniform raw material, a rough cleaning followed. The fibers were carded to orient the loose fibers and then stretched. After combing, the short fibers were removed, the roving began on a flyer . The roving produced in this way became the actual thread on a ring spinning machine.
Then the thread was produced in the twisting mill. After shedding, a preliminary stage of twisting, twisting followed . Then protruding fasting tips were singed off the thread ( gassing ). After the threads were mercerized and dyed, they were packaged and shipped to both textile manufacturers and retailers.
"Anchor"
"Diamond"
"Chain"
"Butterfly"
Effects of the company on St. Pölten
The emergence and growth of the Harlander Coats had a decisive influence on the districts of Harland, Ochsenburg and Stattersdorf. The effects could also be felt in Brunn, Spratzern, St. Georgen and St. Pölten.
Before the Harlander Coats opened their doors, the three present-day districts were predominantly agricultural. This can be illustrated particularly well with the example of Harland. Where in 1822 only 66 people lived in eight houses, more than 500 people worked in 1878, but the families of the workers must also be added to this. This development continued until the First World War. Ochsenburg and Stattersdorf fared in a similar way. Due to the rapidly growing population - the workers moved here from the surrounding area, especially from southern Bohemia and Hungary - more and more apartments were needed. This was largely set up by the company management, almost all of them are still in use today and shape the townscape.
The Harlander Coats founded and financed schools and kindergartens in the three districts. The Harland school and kindergarten were opened in 1883, the school in Stattersdorf in 1870. In Ochsenburg, the company only built one kindergarten, as the school in St. Georgen was not far away. The Harlander Coats also ran three bathhouses , employed a company doctor and had its own small hospital. The Salcher family also had “consumer establishments” and a workers' library built, which is now the Harland office. All of this served to bind the workers to the company as much as possible - if they lost their job, they lost their entitlement to housing and welfare.
The St. Pölten tram , which operated until 1976, can be seen as one of the most important effects . Carl Salcher was the driving force behind its founding , initially mainly for the transport of goods to and from the Westbahn. Only in the course of time did the number of passengers increase, so that the timetable had to be constantly expanded.
During the expansion of the factory facilities, the energy supply had to grow with it, first in the form of water wheels, later with turbines to generate electricity. The Salcher family secured all water usage rights on the right bank of the Traisen between Wilhelmsburg and Stattersdorf. They not only acquired old mills and had them converted, but also built new power plants. The company dug two new Mühlbach streams, Mühlbach Ochsenburg and Luggauer Bach, and the two existing ones were straightened and expanded. In the course of time, seven power plants were built, all of which are still in operation today.
The "long house" in Ochsenburg, a residential building built in 1908
The Luggau power station, named after Maria Luggau , the birthplace of the company founder
The "Amtshaus" built in 1901 originally housed a restoration and is now owned by the city of St. Pölten
The spinning mill acquired in 1869, later used as a canteen and printer
literature
- Magistrate of the City of St. Pölten, 1991: Phoenix from the Ashes - The development of the districts of Harland, Altmannsdorf and Windpassing
- Magistrate of the City of St. Pölten, 1992: A village in stone and farmland - On the history of the St. Georgen district - Ochsenburg
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Manfred Wieninger , 2002: St. Pöltner street names tell , ISBN 3-7066-2208-4 : Entry on Salcherstraße
- ^ Vienna, 1864: Negotiations and communications of Lower Austria. Commercial Associations , page 243. online at Google Books
- ^ Rudolf Büttner , Elfriede Klee , 1959: St. Pölten as an industrial location. (Wiener Geographische Schriften, Volume 8), Chapter 5.b) Overview of industrial companies by size and business class , pp. 35–37
- ^ Thomas Karl et al., 1999: The art monuments of the city of St. Pölten and its incorporated localities , entry on Salcherstraße 38, pages 455–458. ISBN 3-85028-310-0
- ↑ Active Weeks Stattersdorf , chapter on industrial history , pages 30–34
- ^ Manfred Wieninger , 2002: St. Pöltner street names tell , ISBN 3-7066-2208-4 : Entry on Theresienhofgasse
- ↑ Little Chronicle. - Court and staff news. In: Neue Freie Presse , November 15, 1879, p. 5 (online at ANNO ).
- ^ Andreas Resch: Salcher. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 22, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 2005, ISBN 3-428-11203-2 , p. 363 f. ( Digitized version ).
- ↑ Sale of the Harlander twist factory. In: Neue Freie Presse , January 14, 1894, p. 10 (online at ANNO ).
- ^ Actiengesellschaft Salcher & Sons. In: Neue Freie Presse , August 5, 1894, p. 9 (online at ANNO ).
- ↑ Harland cotton mill and twist factory. In: Neue Freie Presse , September 26, 1894, p. 11 (online at ANNO ).
- ^ A b Company logs - Harland. In: Wiener Zeitung , Official Journal, July 31, 1919, p. 592 (online at ANNO ).
- ↑ † Josef Salcher. In: Neue Freie Presse , April 8, 1920, p. 6 (online at ANNO ).
- ^ Company logs - Harland. In: Wiener Zeitung , Official Journal, April 30, 1923, p. 273 (online at ANNO ).
- ^ Franz Mathis , 1987: Big Business in Austria , ISBN 3-7028-0256-8 . Chapter Harlander , pp. 140 - 141. online ( memento of the original from May 1, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. at Google Books
- ↑ Manfred Wieninger , 2002: St. Pöltner street names tell , ISBN 3-7066-2208-4 : Entry to Zwirngasse
- ↑ St. Pölten fire brigade to blow up the chimney in Ochsenburg
- ↑ Yearbook of the state capital St. Pölten 1985–1987 , chapter No industrial cemetery in Harland! , Pages 43 and 44
- ↑ History of the Holz Wallner company ( Memento of the original from September 27, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ^ History of the Starzengruber company
- ↑ a b EVN: hydropower plants
- ^ Company logs - Harland. In: Wiener Zeitung , Official Journal, October 12, 1920, p. 832 (online at ANNO ).
- ^ Manfred Wieninger , 2002: St. Pöltner street names tell , ISBN 3-7066-2208-4 : Entry on Luggauer Weg
Coordinates: 48 ° 10 ′ 4.9 ″ N , 15 ° 38 ′ 16.1 ″ E
