HOUSING SHORTAGE HISTORY HISTORICAL CONTEXT

HOUSING SHORTAGE HISTORICAL OVERVIEW

At the beginning of the 20th century, the largest steel company in the world, ARBED, was formed in Luxembourg. However, the need to house the thousands of workers presented the company with a major dilemma. The result, the logements or “workers housing,” made a permanent impact on the city of Esch-sur-Alzette. To this day, one can still see the impacts of this construction. Through an analysis of building blueprints and images from the time and contemporary interviews and photos, we have attempted to show how these logements not only provided a place to live for ARBED employers, but also transmitted its hierarchy from the factory to the rest of the city.

HISTORICAL CONTEXT

also The rising of the Luxembourg steel industry during the second half of the 19th century was made possible by the interaction of five major conditions: the overall implementation at an industrial level of the steam engine, the rediscovery of “minette” iron core, the construction

THE HOUSE IS THE MESSAGE ? Stéphanie Mouwannes, Katia Neves, Jordan Ricker, and Alvin SoldJanuary 10, 2020 of a national railway, the membership of the GrandDuchy in the German Customs Union (Zollverein), and the Thomas-Gilchrist invention allowing for the dephosphorization of liquid iron. Luxembourg steel industry, mainly located in the southern region of Eschsur-Alzette, entered the ranks of the big players, especially due to the help of labour immigration from Italy, Poland, Germany and even from northern Luxembourg. The growth from the steel industry led to an explosion in population. As an example, in 1913, the population of Esch was 13,000 but in 1930, it had reached 30,000, a 43% increase in just 17 years. This phenomenal growth led to a housing crisis.

ABSENCE OF LEVEL OF COMPLEXITY OF HOUSING

The question we were interested in from the beginning was how (and if) ARBED’s internal hierarchy was reflected through their building of the logements for their workers in the first half of the 20th century.

There is a small but healthy amount of scholarship that relates to this topic already. One cannot talk about Les Terres Rouges without mentioning Denis Scuto and notably his books, Sous le signe de la grande grève de mars 1921: Les années sans pareilles du mouvement ouvrier luxembourgeois 1918-1923 (1990) and, in collaboration with Christophe Knebeler Belval : passé present et avenir d’un site luxembourgeois exceptionnel (1911- 2011) (2010) have been invaluable for their historical context. Another important contribution is an edited work by Scuto, Eschsur-Alzette, du village à la ville industrielle. Art et révolution industrielle au pays de la terre rouge (1989).

For specific focus, we are building off the work of Antoinette Lorang, especially her books Luxemburgs Arbeiterkolonien und billige Wohnungen 1860-1940 (1994) and L’image sociale de l’Arbed à travers les collections du Fonds du logement (2009), both of which examined labour housing between 1860 and 1940 and where she argued that these mass dwellings were based on a social class hierarchy.

Cité “Lallingen” - Projet d un groupe de 2 maisons pour employés, 1947 (ArbedCP-03-0107, National Archives of Luxembourg)

However, while Lorang has focused most on the blue-collar workers of ARBED (les ouvriers) we have decided to direct our research on three other important levels of ARBED’s internal hierarchy: the employés, the

engineers, and the directors. In summary, how are the differences between the three levels of workers reflected in their respective logements?

Type of House: Shared employé house Year of Construction: 1947 How to recognize it?: A moderately-sized house with a basement, ground floor, first floor, and attic. The single balcony on each house with entrances on the sides. Surface Area: 163.4 m2

L’image sociale de l’Arbed à travers les collections du Fonds du logement, 2009 book by Antoinette Lorang