Giesche

Giesche Corp. (Giesche Spolka Akcyjna) – one of the biggest and most respectable companies operating in Upper Silesia, in Poland, during interwar times. It was the biggest Polish zinc producer (40% of country zinc production) and one of the biggest coal producers, possessing zinc mines (the largest in Europe), bituminous coal fields (production 3,500,000 tons yearly), rolling mills and smelters, factories and also agricultural lands and forests. It employed nearly 20 thousand workers, for which housing quarters were built (today famous monumental discricts of Katowice). Its biggest zinc mills were Giesche (later known as Szopienice) and Wilhelmina; biggest coal mines were Giesche (later known as Janow, still later Wieczorek) and Kleofas. The biggest zinc mine was White Sharley (Bleischarley) but it formally belonged to German parent company of Giesche.