Transshipment point in Gmunden

From the salt pans to the horse-drawn railway

The Linz-Gmunden horse-drawn railway took over the main part of the salt transports from 1836 onwards and made the majority of the shipmen unemployed. In 1848, shipmen tore up the rails of the horse-drawn railway, claiming that it was to blame for their plight. This event is part of the protest movement of the Maschinenstürmer, which was directed against the social consequences of mechanisation in the Industrial Revolution.

The destruction of machines or newly built factories was often a means of preventing the replacement of skilled workers by unskilled workers, as intended by factory owners, or of protesting against deteriorating wage and working conditions.

But the decline of salt shipping began as early as 1824, when the state gave up its monopoly of salt transport and left it to private traders. The shipmen were now no longer imperial workers and lost their privileges.

The imperial salt shipping, organised by the Court Chamber in Vienna, came to an end and was replaced by private companies. The shipmen were no longer employees of the Court Chamber, but were confronted with a liberalised market. The salt manufacturers in Gmunden, as private entrepreneurs, naturally had their eye on profit.

The saying "We, the Stadlers, have the work and the Gmundners have the money" illustrates the contrast between work and capital as the shipmen from Stadl Paura felt it and expressed it in this way.