From the history of "Bielska wool" - Piotr Kenig

Bielsko-Biała is a city with 175,000 inhabitants in southern Poland at the foot of the Beskid Mountains, on the Biała River, which for centuries separated historic Silesia from Lesser Poland. Today, associated mainly with the automotive and electrical engineering industries, until recently it was the second center of Polish textile industry after Łódź. They consist of two formerly separate urban centers and 11 rural communes, gradually incorporated from 1925 to 1977.

Located in Cieszyn Silesia, founded in the Middle Ages, Bielsko belonged to the Kingdom of Bohemia from 1327, and in 1526 it came under the rule of the Austrian Habsburgs. After the division of Silesia (1742), the city remained part of Austria, and in the north the border with Prussia (from 1871: the German Empire) was marked by the Vistula River.

Małopolska Biała, founded in the mid-16th century on the opposite bank of the river, in the Duchy of Oświęcim, received city rights in 1723, and in 1772, as a result of the first partition of Poland, it found itself in Galicia, annexed by Austria. The abolition of the state border on the Biała River initiated the process of merging both cities: since the mid-19th century, people wrote about "Bielsko-Biała", emphasizing, especially in relation to industry, that they form an inseparable whole. Both cities remained within the borders of the Danube Monarchy (from 1867: Austria-Hungary) until 1918.

In the interwar period, in the reborn Poland, Bielsko became part of the Silesian Voivodeship, Biała belonged to the Kraków Voivodeship. During World War II, both cities were united and incorporated into the Third Reich (1939–1945). After the war, the former division was briefly restored, and in 1951, Bielsko and Biała were finally merged into one administrative body with today's name.

The sister cities and their immediate surroundings were inhabited for centuries by Germans and Poles, since the Reformation divided into Catholics and Evangelicals, and in the 18th century they were joined by Jews. After 1918, due to the change of nationality, some of the former inhabitants emigrated and were replaced by Polish people, both from the surrounding area and from further parts of the country. At the end of the 1930s, the two-city population within its current administrative borders was approximately 70,000. inhabitants.

World War II brought an end to the multinational and religiously diverse Bielsko-Biała. During the Nazi occupation, Jews were deported to ghettos and extermination camps, and after 1945, Germans were deported. Their place was taken by Poles from nearby villages, displaced persons from the eastern borderlands and newcomers from central Poland. A great wave of migration to the city was caused by the expansion of industry in the 1960s and 1970s. From 1975 to 1998, Bielsko-Biała was the capital of the voivodeship, currently it is the seat of the town and land district.

The twin-city owes its development to 19th-century industrialization. However, the local industry, especially the textile industry, did not arise suddenly, but originated from the guild craft - handicraft - which developed over several centuries.

1. View of Bielsko and Biała with their surroundings, Carl Bollmann, circa 1865/ Výhľad on Bielsko and Biała with their surroundings, Carl Bollmann, 1865

2. Factories in Dolne Przedmieście in Bielsko, circa 1930

Self-actor in Jankowski's factory, 1930s

The activity of cloth weavers in Bielsko is confirmed by a privilege from 1548, issued by Wacław III Adam, Duke of Cieszyn. In the city at the foot of the Beskid Mountains, there was plenty of clean mountain water necessary for dyeing and finishing fabrics, and sheep grazing in the mountain pastures provided the necessary wool. During the Thirty Years' War (1618–1648), which led to the decline of crafts in many European cities, evangelical cloth workers escaping religious persecution settled in the borderland of Bielsko and Biała. The production of fabrics increased, and their sale in Poland was facilitated by the privilege of King John Casimir, granted in 1660. A few years later, a drapers' guild was established in Biała (1667).

At the beginning of the 18th century, Bielsko was already the largest craft center in the Duchy of Cieszyn, the local cloth was considered the best among Silesian and Czech products. In 1734, 271 weaving masters worked in the city, fabrics were finished by cloth shears, and there were dyeworks and several fulling mills. Biała was considered one of the most important cloth centers in western Małopolska.

The reforms initiated in Austria by Maria Theresa and Joseph II after the loss of Silesia (1742) abolished numerous anachronistic guild regulations that hampered economic development, enabling a gradual transition to large-scale production. The first woolen factory was opened in Bielsko (1760), wealthier masters opened more looms, and merchants-wholesalers sold the products. Apart from Poland, the main sales market was Hungary and the countries of the Turkish Empire.

The era of the Napoleonic Wars at the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries brought the greatest flourishing of the guild cloth industry, mainly thanks to supplies for the Habsburg army and the exclusion of English competition by the continental blockade. There were 520 drapers working in Bielsko, and about 150 in Biała. To meet the orders, mechanical spinning machines were brought to the city in 1806, initiating a revolution in the current method of production. In 1811, the first companies obtained the official status of factories, making them independent from guild legislation. The breakthrough event of the industrial revolution was the use of the steam engine (1826).

Entrepreneurs and professionals from all over Europe came to the Bielsko-Biała center. In the early 1840s, full-scale cloth factories were established, carrying out all the necessary technological processes: from wool washing, through spinning, weaving and dyeing, to finishing. From 1855, the railway facilitated the sale of products and the delivery of hard coal from Prussian Silesia. The development of industry was accelerated by the liberalization of internal policy in Austria after 1859. Traditional small-scale crafts, pushed to the margins by mass factory production, had completely disappeared by the end of the century.

At the beginning of the 20th century, there were 75 larger and smaller cloth factories, spinning mills, dyeing mills, weaving mills and finishing plants operating in Bielsko, and there were 15 of them in Biała. Others operated in Komorowice, Aleksandrowice, Wapienica, Kamienica and Mikuszowice. Bielsko and Biała rose to the rank of the third wool industry center in Austria-Hungary, after Moravian Brno and Czech Liberec, and were also the most important textile center in the entire area of ​​Silesia, including its Prussian part. Local products were delivered to customers on all continents.

From the mid-19th century, other branches of industry developed, with significance reaching far beyond local borders. In the textile industry, flax and jute spinning mills and hat factories were established, the metal and machinery industries developed, as well as, among others, spirit, food, paper, wood and construction. The increase in wealth was reflected in the image of Bielsko, called Little Vienna, and its younger sister, Biała, one of the most industrialized cities in Galicia, also became more beautiful.

After 1918, in the changed political and economic situation, the Bielsko-Biała center became the second textile center in Poland after Łódź, and the mass-produced products from Łódź, mainly cotton, could not compete with the high-quality "Bielsko wool". In 1928, 13% of the wool fabrics produced here were exported, which went mainly to the countries of the former Danube Monarchy: Austria, Czechoslovakia and Hungary, and further to Italy, the Balkans, the Middle East and North Africa. After overcoming the economic crisis in the early 1930s, 13% of Polish textile products were manufactured in the twin-city, and the income from their sales exceeded 1/4 of the profits of textile production in the entire country. Bielsko, called the Silesian Manchester, was considered one of the richest and most beautiful cities in the western borders of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth.

During World War II, about 150 larger and smaller production plants operated in the Bielsko-Biała center, many of them fulfilling orders from the Third Reich armaments industry. Small companies were merged into larger enterprises. The consolidation of nationalized plants continued in the times of the People's Republic of Poland: in 1947, 28, in 1950, 13, and in 1964, 9 large woolen industry plants. It was similar in other industries. Due to its diversified production, Bielsko-Biała was called the "city of a hundred industries", in 1965 there were 266 plants operating within the city limits. The largest investment was the construction of the Small Car Factory (FSM) in 1972–1978.

Despite the modernization and expansion of the leading wool industry, the last decade of the 20th century brought its decline. Numerous post-industrial buildings adapted into shopping and service centers remind us of the former importance of this field of production. As well as machines, devices and souvenirs collected in the Old Factory - a branch of the Historical Museum in Bielsko-Biała.