Silberhütte is a village in the town of

Harzgerode Harzgerode is a town in the district of Harz in Saxony-Anhalt, Germany. Geography Harzgerode lies in the lower eastern part of the Harz mountain range on the Selke River, south of Quedlinburg. It is connected to Gernrode and Quedlinburg via ...

in the district of

Harz The Harz (), also called the Harz Mountains, is a highland area in northern Germany. It has the highest elevations for that region, and its rugged terrain extends across parts of Lower Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt, and Thuringia. The name ''Harz'' der ...

in the German state of

Saxony-Anhalt Saxony-Anhalt ( ; ) is a States of Germany, state of Germany, bordering the states of Brandenburg, Saxony, Thuringia and Lower Saxony. It covers an area of and has a population of 2.17 million inhabitants, making it the List of German states ...

. Its name means "silver works", a place where

silver ore Silver is a chemical element; it has symbol Ag () and atomic number 47. A soft, whitish-gray, lustrous transition metal, it exhibits the highest electrical conductivity, thermal conductivity, and reflectivity of any metal. Silver is found in ...

smelted Smelting is a process of applying heat and a chemical reducing agent to an ore to extract a desired base metal product. It is a form of extractive metallurgy that is used to obtain many metals such as iron, copper, silver, tin, lead and zinc. Sm ...

Geography

Silberhütte lies in the Selke valley of the

Lower Harz The Harz (), also called the Harz Mountains, is a Mittelgebirge, highland area in northern Germany. It has the highest elevations for that region, and its rugged terrain extends across parts of Lower Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt, and Thuringia. The nam ...

History

The first recorded mention of Silberhütte dates to the year 1692, which is also the year the place was founded. Hitherto there had been a silver works at this site and several

stamp mill A stamp mill (or stamp battery or stamping mill) is a type of Mill (grinding), mill machine that crushes material by pounding rather than Mill (grinding), grinding, either for further processing or for extraction of metallic ores. Breaking materia ...

s, where ore won from the surrounding mines was processed. The artificial channel built to supply water to the works (from 1904 known as the ''Silberhütter Kunstgraben'') is the longest in the Lower Harz Pond and Ditch System at 25.5 km. Ore was processed all year round in four

smelting Smelting is a process of applying heat and a chemical reducing agent to an ore to extract a desired base metal product. It is a form of extractive metallurgy that is used to obtain many metals such as iron-making, iron, copper extraction, copper ...

furnaces, two sulphur furnaces and a

vitriol Vitriol is the general chemical name encompassing a class of chemical compounds comprising sulfates of certain metalsoriginally, iron or copper. Those mineral substances were distinguished by their color, such as green vitriol for hydrated iron(I ...

works. The

smelter Smelting is a process of applying heat and a chemical reducing agent to an ore to extract a desired base metal product. It is a form of extractive metallurgy that is used to obtain many metals such as iron, copper, silver, tin, lead and zin ...

produced up to 1.6 t of silver and 870 t of lead annually. A

powder mill A powder mill was a mill where gunpowder is made from sulfur, saltpeter and charcoal. Milling steps Crude grinding and mixing operations such as the Frankford Powder-Mill of Philadelphia were a cottage industry until the Industrial Revolution ...

was opened in 1790 which supplied hunters as well as the surrounding Lower Harz mines. The mill was destroyed in 1898 by an explosion, but was immediately rebuilt. From 1893 it also took on the production of

fireworks Fireworks are Explosive, low explosive Pyrotechnics, pyrotechnic devices used for aesthetic and entertainment purposes. They are most commonly used in fireworks displays (also called a fireworks show or pyrotechnics), combining a large numbe ...

- the firm exists today as the ''Pyrotechnik Silberhütte'' (a subsidiary of

Rheinmetall Rheinmetall AG () is a German automotive and arms manufacturer, headquartered in Düsseldorf, Germany. The group was promoted to the DAX, Germany's leading stock market index, in March 2023. It is the largest German and fifth largest Europe ...

Waffe Munition). The factory carried out trials in 1928 with rocket-powered railway vehicles. In the first test the Eisfeld-Valier Rocket I by

Max Valier Max Valier (9 February 1895 – 17 May 1930) was an Austrian rocketry pioneer. He was a leading figure in the world's first large-scale rocket program, Opel-RAK, and helped found the German ''Verein für Raumschiffahrt'' (VfR – "Spacefligh ...

attained a speed of 253 km/h - then a world record. However the vehicle leapt the rails in the third test and was completely destroyed. The village church was built in 1932 and is made entirely of spruce wood.

Places of interest

Besides the forest church with its rectangular

bell tower A bell tower is a tower that contains one or more bells, or that is designed to hold bells even if it has none. Such a tower commonly serves as part of a Christian church, and will contain church bells, but there are also many secular bell to ...

, in which four bronze bells hang, Silberhütte is also home to the ''Unterharzer Waldhof'', a recreation and exhibition complex about

forestry Forestry is the science and craft of creating, managing, planting, using, conserving and repairing forests and woodlands for associated resources for human and Natural environment, environmental benefits. Forestry is practiced in plantations and ...

. This is located on the terrain of the old wood mill - which in turn was built on the site of the old silver works. The Waldhof Festival (''Waldhoffest'') takes place every year with steam engine haulage. The Silberhütte Waldhof is No. 174 in the

Harzer Wandernadel The Harzer Wandernadel is a system of hiking awards in the Harz mountains in central Germany. Hikers (or mountain bikers) can earn awards at different levels of challenge by walking to the various checkpoints in the network and stamping their ...

hiking network. In the area around Silberhütte lies two of the ponds of the Lower Harz Pond and Ditch System - the

Teufelsteich {{Infobox dam , name = Teufelsteich , name_official = , image = Teufelsteich 181849.jpg , image_size = , image_caption = The Teufelsteich , image_alt = , location_map ...

and the

Fürstenteich The Fürstenteich is a reservoir near Silberhütte in the German state of Saxony-Anhalt. It has an earth-filled dam with an impervious core. It impounds the Teufelsgrundbach stream. Construction The dam was based on sedimented shale and has a ...

Transport

Silberhütte has a railway station on the

Selke Valley Railway The Selke Valley Railway (''Selketalbahn''), ''Gernrode-Harzgerode Railway'' (''Gernroder-Harzgeroder Eisenbahn'') and the ''Anhalt Harz Railway'' (''Anhaltische Harzbahn'') were different names for the Metre-gauge railway, metre gauge railway in ...

. From here there are many hiking trails to the old mining ponds nearby. The state road, the ''

Landesstraße ''Landesstraßen'' (singular: ''Landesstraße'' ) are roads in Germany and Austria that are, as a rule, the responsibility of the respective German or Austrian federal state. The term may therefore be translated as "state road". They are road ...

234'', runs through the village.

Sources

www.raymond-faure.comwww.ausflugsziele-harz.dewww.harzlife.de

External links

Website der Stadt Harzgerode
{{DEFAULTSORT:Silberhutte (Harzgerode) Harzgerode Villages in the Harz