Margarethenhütte

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Margarethenhütte , in Upper Sorbian Margarěćina hěta , is the name of a former mining company and the associated factory settlement near Großdubrau in Upper Lusatia in Saxony . The plant, which last traded as VEB Elektroporzellan Großdubrau , was one of the world's leading manufacturers of high-voltage insulators until it was closed in 1991 .

Aerial view

history

Upper Lusatia north of Bautzen has rich deposits of lignite , clay and kaolin , which gave rise to brisk mining in the middle of the 19th century. On June 11, 1854, Dresden nobles bought four parcels of land with a size of 1424 hectares near Großdubrau and founded the clay goods and lignite stock association Großdubrau . Bricks , pottery and porcelain were made from the raw materials stored on site . From 1857 the work was renamed Margarethenhütte AG in honor of Princess Margaret of Saxony .

Isolators of the three-phase transmission Lauffen – Frankfurt (1891)

In 1873 the Berlin porcelain manufacturer Hermann Schomburg took over the Margarethenhütte. From 1877 he specialized in the production of porcelain for pharmacy crockery and electrical insulators. In 1891, the Margerethenhütte supplied the high-voltage insulators for the three-phase transmission between Lauffen and Frankfurt , the world's first functional long-distance line for the transmission of electrical energy. Coal production peaked in 1884 and ceased entirely in 1905.

The Margarethenhütte was located off the railway lines built until the end of the 19th century. The secondary line Bautzen – Hoyerswerda , which went into operation in November 1890 , also ran further west, so that all products had to be brought to the next train station by horse and cart. It was not until 1906 that the plant received a standard-gauge siding from the newly opened Löbau – Radibor railway line .

In the years that followed, the plant made a name for itself as one of the world's leading producers of electrical ceramics, especially for high-voltage transmission lines. The problem was that the kaolins stored on site could not be used for high-voltage insulators. The merger with the Kahla porcelain factory to form Hermsdorf-Schomburg-Isolatoren GmbH (HESCHO) in 1922 and the use of supplied raw materials ensured further development. At the end of the 1920s, the plant finally had up to 1,400 employees.

From 1936 the Margarethenhütte was involved in armaments production, which led to the almost complete dismantling of reparations by the Soviet occupying forces after the Second World War .

The reconstruction of the plant began under difficult conditions in November 1945. The first kiln went back into operation in April 1946. Initially only tableware was produced.

On July 1, 1948, the company was transferred to public ownership as VEB Elektroporzellan Großdubrau . In the next few decades, as part of the Hermsdorf Ceramic Works , the company again achieved a leading position in the market for high-voltage insulators. From the mid-1950s, the production of radiators made of porcelain was also started. These were then partially processed into mobile electric radiators.

After the political change in the GDR in 1990, the profitability of the company was called into question by the Treuhandanstalt despite the most modern production facilities . On April 30, 1991, Margarethenhütte stopped production despite the existing order book. Machines were dismantled and transported away. According to statements made by employees at the time, files on recipes and manufacturing processes were also collected later. By 1993 the company was liquidated.

Today there is a small museum on the history of electrical porcelain production in Großdubrau on the site of the former Margarethenhütte.

See also

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ History of the Margerethenhütte on www.museum-mhuette.de
  2. ↑ Stefan Locke: From the end of speechlessness. Ever since Saxony's Minister of Integration, Petra Köpping, started talking about the tough period after the reunification, shattering stories have come to light. In: Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung of August 3, 2017, p. 3.
  3. ^ Bernhard Honnigfort: Old stories, bad memories. Frankfurter Rundschau, June 22, 2017; accessed on October 25, 2019

Coordinates: 51 ° 15 ′ 4.2 ″  N , 14 ° 27 ′ 10.2 ″  E