Innerberger Main Union
The Innerberger Hauptgewerkschaft is a historic Austrian company in the iron industry and iron marketing.
With Innerberg, the company bears the old name of the town of Eisenerz near the Styrian Erzberg, which was used until the 18th century . The name union has nothing to do with employee representation. The trades were independent contractors, namely the Radmeister which concerned the production of pig iron, the hammer champion or hammer men who dealt with the processing of the pig iron into steel and iron, and the iron dealer or publisher who carried out the wide distribution of hardware. The union in this case was a merger of the trades. A trade was mostly not only an industrialist but also a landowner who obtained a large part of its fuel and food requirements from its own land.
The main trade union in Innerberg existed from 1625 to 1881. It was a predecessor company of the Österreichisch-Alpine Montangesellschaft and thus also of today's voestalpine AG . In the eventful history of these companies there are certain parallels, especially with regard to the repeated changes in the structure of ownership. At times these ventures were completely nationalized, at times they were partly nationalized and partly private and sometimes also predominantly or entirely privately owned.
prehistory
In the 14th century, by order of the sovereign, the mining of iron ore on the Styrian Erzberg , the production of the pig iron and the further processing were clearly arranged. The upper half of the mountain was developed from the Vordernberg to the south , while the lower part was exploited by Innerberg, today's iron ore. A horizontal line at 1186 m above sea level, the so-called Ebenhöhe, divided the mountain. An iron regulation, issued in 1448, also led to a division of the sales areas. Northern Europe was supplied from Innerberg, while south-eastern Europe, via Venice to the Levant , received iron from Vordernberg. The iron trade was concentrated in Steyr and Leoben , which were able to establish themselves as privileged centers in this regard. As early as 1287, Steyr received the great privilege from the sovereign for trading in Innerberger iron and in 1314 Leoben for trading in Vordernberger iron.
Pig iron was produced in wheel mills from the 15th century . There were 19 wheel works in Innerberg and 14 in Vordernberg. The businesses belonged to the individual trades, which in turn had ore rights to the mountain. The ore was extracted by the miners employed by the trades.
As is often the case, in the iron industry of that time, more was earned in trading than in production. The iron dealers were called publishers because they had to grant the Rad- und Hammermeistern Verlag , that is, pre-financing. The financial superiority of the publishers resulted in a dependence of the wheel and hammer trades over time.
History of the Innerberger Main Union
In order to improve the situation, in 1625, under Emperor Ferdinand II, the main members of the iron industry in the area north of the Erzberg were combined in one company. There were 19 wheel works in Innerberg (Eisenerz), 18 Welschhammer works including the associated small hammers near Großreifling , Sankt Gallen , Weißenbach an der Enns and Altenmarkt near Sankt Gallen , furthermore 17 hammer works in Laussa , in Kleinreifling and Reichraming , seven hammer works in Weyer and two hammer mills in Hollenstein an der Ybbs including buildings, land and forests and the iron dealers of the city of Steyr . The whole thing took place under the strong control of the Prince's Chamber of Commerce. This created the largest industrial company in Austria at the time. The trades and hammer masters became partners. The senior officials of the new society also came from these strata. In the Vordernberg and Leoben areas, the structure remained essentially unchanged.
The Innerberger Main Union was with 2000 to 3000 employees and an annual production of approx. 5000 tons of iron in the 17th century the largest iron producing company in the world. This early capitalist mining group also included extensive forest ownership, forest use rights, facilities for rafting wood and charcoal production .
Relatively few people were employed in ore mining and processing. In 1678, the Innerberg Main Union employed 2,624 people, before that only 153 miners. In contrast, 824 workers were required for the wheel works and the wood supply, 973 for the hammer mills and 800 for the charcoal burner.
At the top were the senior officials, who on the one hand were officials of the sovereign, on the other hand, as so-called administrators, they themselves performed entrepreneurial functions. Next to it stood a mountain judge and some clerks and below, but above the workers, the foremen, the so-called hat people .
When it turned out that even after the merger in the new construction, the dependency on the Steyr iron dealers remained and that these made high profits while the entire union made losses, a reorganization was carried out in 1669. The union was completely subordinated to the Chamber of Commerce and thus became a quasi-public, state-directed and controlled company. The seat of the chambergrave was in the Kammerhof in Innerberg-Eisenerz.
As the English competition became stronger and stronger, the city of Steyr took over sole ownership of the Innerberg main union in 1783. The chamber count's office was abolished and the Innerberg main trade union was granted its independence again in 1787 and Steyr took over its leadership.
In 1798 the city of Steyr sold its union shares to the kk priv. Canal- und Bergbaugesellschaft . Finally in 1807, in dire straits and in the patriotic feeling of the Napoleonic Wars, the Innerberg main trade union returned to state control, namely to the Montan-Arar . The kk Hofkammer for the minting and mining was entrusted with the management . In 1818 the Imperial and Royal Steiermärkisch-Österreichische Eisenwerk Direction was established in Eisenerz.
The modernization and reduction of the number of fresh smelters and hammer mills, the construction of three blast furnaces in Eisenerz and Hieflau to replace the old raft furnaces , which had become unprofitable, and the improved transport on and in the Erzberg resulted in the Innerberg main union becoming a very solid company.
After nationalization at the end of the 18th century, it was privatized again in 1869. As a result of the defeat in the German War in 1866, the state had to sell the Innerberg main union in order to meet its obligations. The buyer was the Österreichische Creditanstalt , which, however , had to struggle with the consequences of the founders' crash of 1873.
In 1881 the Österreichisch-Alpine Montangesellschaft was founded, from which the Innerberger main union was taken over together with most of the other Styrian and Carinthian industrial companies in the iron industry.
literature
- Ernst Bruckmüller : Social history of Austria. 2nd Edition. Publishing house for history and politics ao, Vienna ao 2001, ISBN 3-7028-0361-0 .
- Reinhard Fahrengruber: Eisenstraße experience. A cultural and historical travel guide. Styria, Graz et al. 2001, ISBN 3-222-12845-6 .
- Roman Sandgruber : Austrian History. Economy and Politics. Austrian economic history from the Middle Ages to the present. Ueberreuter, Vienna 1995, ISBN 3-8000-3531-6 .
- Anton Tautscher : The capitulation of the Innerberger main trade union and the first merger of the alpine iron industry in 1625. Academic printing and publishing establishment, Graz 1973, ISBN 3-201-00861-3 .
Historical sources:
- Anton Ritter v. Pantz : The trades under the spell of the Styrian Erzberg. C. Gerold's Sohn, Vienna 1918.
source
- Roman Sandgruber: The state made of steel . In: diePresse.com , September 20, 2003 (Spectrum)
Individual evidence
- ↑ Gerhard Deissl: To organize the iron being in the Styrian Erzberg area from the late Middle Ages to the time of Emperor Joseph II .: the Innerberger main union and the Vordernberger Radmeisterkommunität. In: The Styrian Erzberg - its economic, social and cultural significance. 1300 years of ore mining on the Styrian Erzberg 712–2012 (= Res montanarum. 2012, special volume, ISSN 1727-1797 ). Montanhistorischer Verein Österreich, Leoben-Donawitz 2012, pp. 59–68, here p. 60.