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Where once rollers roared, the smell of iron and grease hung in the air, and during the times of the Alfredhütte and the hot rolling mill the air shimmered with heat, today lies kulturWERKwissen. 3000 people worked in their "WERK," as the affectionate name of the workers who came from the entire Westerwald and the Sieg region in company buses. Bricks and concrete now form the backdrop for the events of Wissener eigenART, the volunteer working group for culture.
Pits, furnaces, and rolling mills provided work and sustenance in the Sieg city for over a century. In the region's mines, the iron ore was extracted and transported to Wissen via a sophisticated cable car system and railway. The famous photographs of the renowned photographer Peter Weller, who captured the Siegerland ore mining, which also included Wissen, serve as a reminder of this.
In 1911, the rolling mill was built in Wissen. State-of-the-art, complex rolling lines later reduced the thick, hot "slabs" to size. Initially, this was done by hand and with machines working in concert: "Snappers" and "Dopplers" (the job titles at the time) took the slabs from the soaking furnace by hand and placed them into the rollers. Sheets were sometimes folded using feet (wooden shoes). In the mid-60s, this heavy labor was replaced by modern rolling lines that turned steel coils into the finest, paper-thin sheets. The most famous product is the tin can.
The current kulturWERKwissen hall (opened in 2009) was approved in 1933 as the “Training and Repair Workshop of the Blast Furnace Works Alfredhütte,” a significant part of the Wissener rolling mill. The furnace with its distinctive wind heaters existed from 1873 until 1945. The "Sandberg" made of black smelting sand and slag still exists today. It is the only remaining clearly visible sign of the former mining site of Wissen. The last mines were closed in the early 60s, the blast furnace plant was demolished after the war, and the rolling mill has not existed since 1995. The people of Wissen have succeeded: With much dedication and help from the town and the association community Wissen and the kulturWERKwissen support association - they are "coating" it - something new has emerged on historic ground: a modern hall of industrial culture with 40,000 visitors annually (2019). A place of significance where thousands of young individuals were formerly trained as metalworkers and blacksmiths for the metal industry and many of whom now run medium-sized companies in the Westerwald-Sieg region.
The event hall in the former rolling mill
Contact and directions
Walzwerkstraße 2257537 Wissen
Contact
+492742911664
mail@kulturwerk-wissen.de
Related links
https://kulturwerkwissen.chayns.net/
