The print of the month for March is “Das Ventile, Hatttingen, Germany” Hattingen is a lovely little town on the Ruhr river in western Germany. It is certainly worth a visit to see the old timber houses and original city wall, but that is not what brought me here. The Ruhr region has heavy deposits of coal and formed the industrial center of Germany in the early 1800s. Wikipedia tells me there were 300 coal mines in operation in 1850, and where there’s coal there’s steel, and rust, and industria to photograph! The Germans seem to have a respect for this heritage and have preserved a number of the mines and steel processing plants, even making an “Industrial Heritage Trail” for us tourists. It was a great trip and I definitely look forward to visiting again.
