From the beginning till today - the history of the brick manufacture Rusch

Based on 'the great fire' in Hamburg in 1842 came a huge requirement of building materials therefore that about 20 % of the buildings were destroyed. Because of the bad experiences with wood, the fire-proofed bricks were in a great demand. The only problem was: how to produce that many bricks? But this problem changed with Friedrich-Eduart Hoffmanns (1818-1900) invention of the circular kiln. Hoffmann applied 'his circular kiln' for a patent in 1859 ans with this, the foundation stone for the industrial production was laid down.

From this point you just needed plenty of the basic materials and these were found in the ancient river valley of the Elbe, where high quality clay has sedimented over million of years. Due to the fact that the removal of this clay was already at this early time not too complex, a big brick-boom developed in the second half of the 19th century. Therefore over a hundred brick manufactures settled down at the cost between Hamburg and Cuxhaven.

At this time it was also Hinrich Rusch who builded his brick manufacture at the 'Ritscher Außendeich'. As nearly as all brick manufactures at this time, also the brick manufacture Rusch was practiced as a companion plant to a farming concern. The first guaranteed brick-deliveries happened since 1881.

But within the world economic crisis in the 1920s this brick-boom ended and it came to a first big dying of the brick manufactures. Although the brick manufacture Rusch endured this hard time, family Rusch decided at the beginning of the 1930s to rent out the brick manufacture and focus themselves on farming.

In 1952 resumed family Rusch the brick manufacture again. After the early death of her husband Johann Rusch sen. led Walthild Rusch the business. Because of the rebuilding of the destroyed Germany, prior Hamburg, the brick manufatcures around the Elbe had again good years.

Rising energy costs at the end of the year of the economic miracle at the beginning of the 1970s and a higher appearance of modern backing bricks like gas concret and sand-lime bricks caused the extinction of many factories.

At this hard time it was Johan Rusch jun. who took over the family business in 1974. Due to the huge storm flood in 1976, Johann Rusch decided to stop the farming business and focus on the building of bricks.

In 1990 joined Matthias Rusch the parental business. He showed courage and let install a new squeezing machine that ensures the existing of the brick manufacture till today. Because of this new machine and the roller plant the risen requirements the to product can still be fulfilled.

In 2006 Matthias Rusch ventured again a radical changing: he stopped the labor intensive and on the weather depending air-dehydration and attached four industrial drying chambers. This step reduced the drying time of the bricks from about 6-8 weeks on to six days. The required energy the brick manufacture obtains from a block heating station that runs with renewable energy sources. In spite of the connectivitiy to the traditional brick manufactoring, Matthias Rusch is always considered to optimize the production process. Therefore the need of the stone coal was reduced to 60 % by the use of wood pellets.