Zollverein Coal Mine Industrial Complex
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How it came to be
In 1847 Franz Haniel founded the Zollverein mining company, and the sinking of Shaft 1 began on 18 February. The company took its name from the German Customs Union, the Zollverein, established in 1834. Mining began in 1851.
In 1932 Shaft 12, designed by the architects Fritz Schupp and Martin Kremmer, opened. Its buildings, which joined form and function in the language of the Bauhaus, became known as the most beautiful coal mine in the world. The whole working system survives: pits, coking plant, railway lines, spoil heaps and miners' housing.
In 1967 eleven shafts closed, leaving Shaft 12 alone. Mining stopped on 23 December 1986, and the coking plant closed on 30 June 1993. In 2001 the complex was inscribed as a record of about 150 years of the rise and decline of heavy industry, and the former coal washery now houses the Ruhr Museum.
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