Life & Work in the GDR: Hirschberg Leather Factory

The photograph was taken on a cold, dull, dreary day, and has been scanned so as to bring out detail in its darkest areas. This process did not improve details of the sign on the top of the building, which reads:

VEB LEDERFABRIK HIRSCHBERG


VEB

VEB is short for Volkseigener Betrieb, or Publically Owned Business.  This does not indicate that it was a cooperative for its workers.  The VEB was the main legal form for an industrial organisation, and the great majority of East German workers were employed in VEBs.


Hirschberg

Hirschberg was in the GDR, or East Germany.  You will find it on the map for this blip.  The photograph was taken from West Germany, the boundary was demarcated by at this point by a the river Saale.  In the foreground of the photo are the remains of a bridge over the Saale, which had been destroyed during World War II.


Leather Factory

Most of the factory was demolished, but the older administration buildings (centre and right of photo) were retained and renovated; they now house a Museum of Tanning and Town History.

The original tannery - a factory for converting skins into leather - was established here in 1741.  The proximity of the river was essential, as the tanning process requires a substantial water supply.  The business expanded over the 19th century, and in the 1930s had 1,500 employees.  It specialised in the production of leather soles for shoes.

After World War II the business was nationalised.  The last leather soles were sold in this year, 1966, and the business switched to the production of leather "uppers" (for shoes again) and leather for furniture production.  It closed in 1992, unable to cope in the  new competitive environment.


Iron Curtain

On the northern bank of the Saale is a high concrete wall.  The presence of one metal support higher than the others suggests that the wall was topped with barbed wire: this would keep the fascists at bay!

A few yards behind the concrete wall is a second wall, invisible from  my standpoint.

The inhabitants were subject to a nighttime curfew until the 1970s.  Locals considered undesirable by the GDR authorities were evicted from the town.



This photo was taken in March 1966, I have no record of its precise date and have thus had to make a guess.


PHOTOGRAPHIC INFORMATION
Photo taken with Kodak Box Brownie Camera, using black and white film

[This blip added in April 2014]