Meidling slaughterhouse
The Meidling slaughterhouse existed between 1888 and 1953 and was located on an area surrounded by Spittelbreitengasse, Ruckergasse , Hohenbergstrasse (laid out here around 1900) and Aichholzgasse in the 12th district of Vienna , Meidling, which was incorporated in 1892 .
history
After the introduction of a general slaughterhouse obligation for Großhornvieh cattle also for the Viennese suburbs, a slaughterhouse was set up in the area of Unter-Meidling. Until then, the butchers either had to be slaughtered in Vienna or they slaughtered themselves in private rooms that could not be subjected to hygienic controls. Before the Meidling slaughterhouse was completed, the butchers from Meidling were assured that they would use the Gumpendorf slaughterhouse.
The Meidling slaughterhouse located in the judicial district of Sechshaus was opened on September 2, 1888. Nineteen communities were allowed and had to use this new slaughterhouse, namely Fünfhaus , Gaudenzdorf , Obermeidling , Untermeidling , Rudolfsheim , Sechshaus , Altmannsdorf , Baumgarten , Breitensee , Hacking , Hetzendorf , Hietzing , Hütteldorf , Inzersdorf , Lainz , Penzing , Speising , Ober Sankt Veit and Under St. Vitus . The cattle to be slaughtered were driven from the Vienna Central Cattle Market in Sankt Marx outside the line in the area of today's Gudrunstraße , Margaretengürtels and Marx-Meidlinger Straße until 1910, after which the public cattle drive within Vienna was prohibited and the animals had to be transported in closed wagons.
For the construction of the slaughterhouse, which was located on steep terrain, large amounts of earth had to be dug, which was piled up further up to the so-called Flohberg. Today it is behind the Meidlinger training barracks . The slaughterhouse area was trapezoidal and measured about 200 meters on the long sides and 115 and 145 meters on the broad sides. The main entrance was in Spittelbreitengasse, the area was enclosed by a 3 meter high wall. There were 10 buildings in the slaughterhouse, which included stables, slaughterhouses, slaughterhouses and administrative and residential buildings. Electric lights and running water had already been introduced everywhere. In the first few years up to 1900, an average of 65,000 slaughterings per year were carried out, mainly cattle, to a lesser extent also calves, sheep, goats, lambs and fawns. From 1897 pigs were stung here in rooms that were provisionally furnished for this purpose, but only until the pig slaughterhouse in Sankt Marx was completed in 1910. While 12,000 pig slaughterings were initially carried out in Meidling, this number fell to 7,000 at the end.
From 1899 the Meidlinger slaughterhouse was a sterilization facility for inferior and poorly finned meat, which in this way could be made harmless to health and sold cheaply. In 1910 it was also closed because of the new building in Sankt Marx.
During the First World War, the number of slaughter fell continuously to 29,000. A large part of the slaughter cattle came from Hungary and the east of the monarchy, where there was now fighting. After the collapse of the monarchy and the disappearance of the countries that had previously delivered cattle to Vienna, there was a marked shortage of beef in 1919. Beef had to be rationed and each received only 10 days of beef per week. For reasons of rationality, the Nussdorf slaughterhouse was closed in 1915 , and the one in Hernals in 1920 . From 1918 Meidling was given the opportunity to slaughter horses. While 20,000 horses were initially slaughtered, the number fell to 3,400 the following year. For example, rooms that were not used were rented out as storage rooms or given to social aid organizations.
In 1926, another open-air bank sales point was opened in the Meidling slaughterhouse , which enabled the numerous poor sections of the population to purchase cheap meat. Mainly inferior types of meat were sold here, but they were perfectly hygienic. In order to prevent abuse, one could only buy 3 kilograms of such cheap meat per person per day. The horse meat survey that was carried out here also gained importance for Meidling in the 1920s. In 1933 only 2 slaughterhouses were in operation in Meidling, in which 85 cattle were slaughtered every day.
The threatened closure of the Meidling slaughterhouse was initially prevented by the annexation of Austria to the German Reich in 1938. The German slaughter cattle market regulation was introduced and Meidling became a municipal horse slaughterhouse from 1939. At the same time, larger quantities of foreign horse meat came to Vienna, which were subjected to a detailed veterinary examination. While Meidling was an economically important company in the first few years of the war, its importance continued to decline in the course of the war. Horses were increasingly used by the Wehrmacht and, contrary to the statutory provisions, numerous Gauleiter refused to export horses from their administrative areas, so that fewer and fewer horses came to Meidling. In 1945 the slaughterhouse was badly damaged by American bombings and ceased operations.
After the war, the English occupation troops used the buildings as storage rooms. As there was more and more illegal house slaughter, repair work for the Meidling slaughterhouse began in 1949, so that it was available again as a horse slaughterhouse in 1950. The horse market was also held here. While further renovation work was in progress, the decision was made to demolish the slaughterhouse in 1951. On December 31, 1951, the slaughterhouse was closed. The building was demolished in 1953. In its place, a municipal residential complex was built between 1953 and 1956, and in 1963 an artificial stone sculpture by Gabriele Waldert was placed in the green area. This plastic shepherd with calf is still reminiscent of the former Meidling slaughterhouse.
literature
- Hermann Gsandtner: Brief outline of the history of the meat supply in Vienna, in particular the area of today's 12th district of Vienna, with special consideration of the slaughterhouses Gumpendorf and Meidling . Sheets of the district museum Meidling, issue 68, 2007.
Web links
Coordinates: 48 ° 10 ′ 32.4 " N , 16 ° 19 ′ 29.2" E