The Magnolia gazette. [volume] (Magnolia, Miss.) 1872-current, 1886-04-30

ulchb VI SttuucbOllo, anu upon IL tlllS III
scription: "Here rests Barbara Utt-
mann, died 14th Of January, 1875.
She it was that in the year 1861,
through her invention of point lace, be-
came the benefactor of the Hartz
mountains" This inscription is SO
far incorrect in that the art of lace
making was already practiced in the
Netherlands, consequently was not in 4
vented but introduced. Yet should
Barbara Uttmann be known as the
benefactor of her home and is truly even
until this day. for it was she who
brought the bobbin into the Hartz
mountains.
1t was the same in the Wild Ecke,
as the rough and wooded environs of
the Pohlbergs, toward the end of the
year 1900, was called. The 9th of
October, 1902, through Kaspar Drechs-
Ter, from Frohman, the first lode of sill
yer ore in Schreckenberg was discov-
cred. Quickly from there the news ex-
tended and cuttings were made in many
other places, and even to Prozel the
rich vein of silver ore was uncovered.
The whole region was raised and
wakened up. The hamlet which sprang
up around the first mine, called Anna
berg, had already grown to be town.
Since 1926 Heinrich Won Etterlein had
been superintendent of the mines.
He was descended from a patrician
family, was born in Nuremberg in 1885
and died in Etterlein in 1882.
To him in 1914 was born daughter
who was called Barbara, and was pre-
destined to give work and a livelihood
to the women of the Hartz mountains.
At an early age she showed great skill
and dexterity in all woman's work and
especially in lace-making, with which
only the wives and daughters of people
of the highest rank then occupied them
selves. This lace was used chiefly for
the decoration of the altar, the COM
munion cloth and the priests robes,
and required much time and greatlabor.
Barbara sought for that reason an easier
and less time-consuming method of
making point lace, and in collar which
she gave to her betrothed, Christopher
uttmann, on the morning of their we'd
ding day has furnished proofs that her
efforts and search were not in vain The
collar was the first bobbin work that
was seen in the Hartz mountains.
Christopher Uttman came from Lowen-
berg,in Schlesien, to Annaberg and
grew to be a rich land-holder, to the
surprise of those who had previously
known him. Recently this invention
of lace work has been called in ques-
ton, and it is now generally accepted
that Barbara Uttman learned it
from Netherlander. This is high
| ly probable and also easily un-
derstood since the settlement
of Netherland silk-weavers at Buchholz,
near Annaberg, took place in 1861, and
lace-work of white and yellow thread
may have been made, as it was by no
means unlikely. that. among the many
which the lode star of the mines drew
toward Annaberg some should have
/ been lace-makers.
Certain it is that Barbara Uttmann,
who herself drove profitable trade in
| point lace, both taught and extended
this useful art in Annaberg. How
quickly the same became national one
sees when in 1868 there broke out in the
Hartz mountains pestilence which in
Annaberg alone swept away eight hun
dred lace-makers, the manufacture hav-
ing only begun in 1861.
From Annaberg, also this pleasant
and lucrative employment spread to all
the neighboring mountain towns, where
it also became specially. Villagers
| who wished to engage in it must, ac-
cording to an ordinance of 1909, pay a
tax for that privilege.
| In the year 1000 the number of steady
lace-makers rose to ten thousand, and
ere twenty years it reached fifty thou
sand, while about twenty thousand adj
ditional makers came in the winter sea-
son. In later times in the summer
there We're between thirty-five and forty
thousand at work. The profit sank
with the increase of workers. Whilst
in the early part of the century skillful
worker could earn ten groschen day
afterward not even if she gave herself nc
moment'srest from morning till evening
could she earn more than six groschep
and in bad years even less. So little
indeed, that even hard, honest worl
could not hinder poverty from entering
the frugal little dwellings,. The woveT
lace which in 1909 began to be made il
England drove out the hand made
AS is everywhere the case where ma
chinery contends with hand work, i
lowered the price of the latter to slucl
below its value, and the people of th,
Hartz mountains were obliged to en-
gage in the unequal struggle with tn,
new power which gives this century it
individuality. Alas! they did itnot il
the right manner, they sought not b,
perfection, but by cheapness, to vie witt
the Nottingham lace. "That this is no
the right way to contepd against TIN
machine work." said Beethold Sigis