Gabriel 150 years - Flipbook - Page 30
panded from two shifts to three in the spinning
mill and in the winding department. It may have
been the large amount of work to be done that, in
June ±∫µ≥, encouraged the textile workers’ union
to try to negotiate a new piecework agreement
with Managing Director Folke Müller. These negotiations ended abruptly when (according to
the union) the director, in a fit of rage, refused to
admit the head of the union to the factory. Another reason for the unrest may have been that
Folke Müller was a strict disciplinarian.
A week later, hot weather led to dissatisfaction: When the temperature in the new weaving
room reached ≤πoC, the weavers went home.
The company had tried to ensure good ventilation in the weaving room, but this had an unfortunate consequence, and several workers complained that draughts gave them “rheumatism in
the head”.
A fire drill. ±∫µ±.
Large orders led to more jobs. According to the
wool”, a graphic description, clearly suggesting
textile workers’ union, the number of employees
the value this product would have had in normal
engaged in manufacturing increased from ∂≥ in
times. But in these years when nothing of a better
±∫≥∫ to ∫≥ in ±∫µ≥. But the composition of the
quality was available, any kind of wool could be
workforce had changed considerably in those
used, and the “piss wool” was thoroughly washed
four years. When the new power looms were start-
and used in the production process.
ed in ±∫µ≤, fewer weavers were needed, while, in
But there was a lack of even poor quality wool.
particular, more young women under the age of
Kjærs Mølle began, therefore, to supply fabric
≤∞ were hired. The new looms did not, however,
made of so-called “shoddy” or old woollen rags
alter the fact that the weavers continued to earn
and woollen fabric that was boiled, torn to pieces,
the highest wage among the factory workers.
carded and then spun and rewoven.
The purchase of the new looms in ±∫µ≤ mark-
The market was insatiable, and imagination
ed the beginning of an era of mechanisation in
came into play in finding alternative raw materi-
the manufacturing process, calling for fewer pro-
als from which to manufacture cloth. Paper was
fessionally trained weavers.
spun and woven into surprisingly strong rugs.
The hair cut off by ladies’ hairdressers (the hair of
women often being longer than men’s hair) was
“Piss wool”, paper and hair
collected, and the hair of dogs and horses was
Immediately following the occupation of Den-
also used in Kjærs Mølle’s cloth.
mark by German forces in ±∫µ∞, the supply of
wool from Australia and New Zealand ordinarily
There was a pronounced lack of almost every-
used by Kjærs Mølle came to a halt. Instead, it was
thing, also in the homes of the employees, and,
necessary to make do with poorer quality Danish
not surprisingly, some probably found it diffi-
wool. The poorest quality of all was known as “piss
cult to resist temptation. In September ±∫µµ,
1940-1945
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