Community Houses in Essen.
Essen lies twenty-two miles north of Düsseldorf on the main railway to Berlin. This is a very thickly populated district, and the center of a network of railways which makes it accessible to the Westphalia coal fields. It is a gloomy-looking town of gray slate roofs, only brightened by emerald green shutters. The whole town depends on the Krupp plant for their livelihood, except the store-keepers and a few hundred men who manufacture woolen goods, cigars and dyes.
The present Krupp works cover over 150 acres, and the daily output in time of peace is 1977 tons, and many times greater in time of war. In 1907 they employed 64,354 workmen, and each year this number had increased. They make all kinds of guns of all calibers—guns for naval and coast defenses, siege guns, fortress guns, field guns, armor shields and disappearing carriages for hoisting and transporting machinery for ammunition. They produce crucible, Martin, puddled and Bessemer steel, and also steel castings. They make ammunition with fuses and bursting charges, armor piercing shells, explosive steel shells, torpedo shells, cast iron shells, shrapnel, case shot and fuse setters. Besides these warlike productions they make railway material, engineering material, and sheet iron for motor cars.
400 Damaged French and English Cannon Being Repaired at the Krupp Factory.
Plans have been made to erect a gigantic branch of the Krupp works at Munich. These works will cover one hundred acres, and the city of Munich recognizing this opportunity for further developments, has provided enough ground for private industries that are bound to follow Krupp.
A View of the Mills.
The house of Krupp has worked out an elaborate scheme for the benefit of their workingmen. It is not a charity scheme, but a building scheme for both workmen and employer. The scheme was carried out by Alfred Friedrich Krupp. He built 5469 dwellings, well lighted houses, with as much space between them as possible and each with a little garden. All the houses have good water. Three thousand of the houses were built within fifteen minutes' walk from the works. The men longest in the firm's employ and with the largest families were given the selection of the houses.
Policemen and teachers are eligible to become tenants of the dwellings. The leases are very binding and forbid the carrying on of business in the houses, sub-letting, quarreling with the neighbors, disorderly noises, the building of additions, misuse of the drains, the keeping of animals that are disturbing to the neighbors, smoking stove-pipes without covers and the lighting of the fire with oil.