Thorshammar’s Workshop

In the 19th century, years of crop failure followed one after another. Many people suffered from hunger and dreamed of starting a new life. Between 1830 and 1930, around 1.3 million people emigrated from Sweden, with 1 million traveling to the USA.
However, not everyone felt at home abroad; many returned to where they felt safe and had their friends. During their journey, they encountered different people with new ideas. Some ideas were more concrete than others.
 
Why not organize production in a different way than what had traditionally been done—where an ironworks owner or manager owned everything and controlled the lives of their workers? Why couldn’t ordinary workers join together, contribute a small sum each, and thereby raise the capital needed to start a business? This idea was called cooperation, from the English word “cooperation,” which means collaboration.
 
One of the early thinkers in this direction was brass worker Per Erik Pettersson.
Per Erik was an enterprising man who had opened a small brass workshop in Kärrgruvan, outside Norberg. When he heard about a waterfall in Hinsebo, north of Norberg, that was available for lease, he decided to take the opportunity. There was also an abandoned nail smithy there, called Thorshammar’s Workshop, named after patron Thor Vithfeldt, who had previously operated the smithy.
 
It was exactly what Per Erik had wished for. He managed to persuade some brass workers from Skultuna Brassworks, where he had worked early in his career, to join him. However, he was not entirely comfortable being an employer. He preferred to start a cooperative—an arrangement that suited him better. In 1876, everything was ready, and he founded a cooperative joint-stock company, Thorshammars Verkstad AB.
 
More and more brass workers were drawn to the cooperative. By 1878, there were 20 people working there, and at its peak, there were 33! The brass, which they used to manufacture coffee pots, faucets, soldering tubes, oil cans, and much more, was initially purchased from Skultuna Brassworks.
 
However, working with metal in simple wooden buildings was extremely fire-prone, and in 1886, the worst happened. The smithy caught fire, and everything burned down to the ground. The only part that remained was the foundry section.
It was a severe setback, but Per Erik and his colleagues refused to give up. The workshop was rebuilt the following year. This time, it was constructed from slag stone. Even so, another fire broke out. However, this time, the building survived except for its windows, although many wooden models were lost in the fire.
The workshop remained in use until 1983, even though in its final years, it only accepted brass items for repair and polishing.
 
FACTS
An abandoned yet intact mechanical workshop.
Thorshammars Verkstad AB was registered in 1876 and is one of Sweden’s oldest joint-stock companies. The workshop produced chandeliers, decorative items, faucets and various types of fittings, kerosene stove parts, oil cans and grease guns, drinking water cisterns, wine and cistern taps, weights ranging from 1 gram to 500 grams, and much more.
The current workshop building was constructed in 1887. Around the turn of the 20th century, the workforce peaked at 33 workers.
Tin production ceased in 1936, but decorative brass items continued to be made until the 1960s, when a spring flood destroyed the foundry furnace. In its final years, the workshop only accepted copper vessels for polishing and repairs. The workshop closed permanently in 1983.
 
Thorshammars Verkstad is now a listed historical building and is set to become a living industrial museum where the machines in the workshop, with their overhead belt drive system, will be powered by the original energy source—the water turbine in the waterfall.
NOTE!
Due to ongoing investigations of the buildings and land, it is currently not possible to visit Thorshammars Verkstad.

Toppbild + liten bild nr 1 & 4: Fredrik Findahl