Word: bergfrauen
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TIME, Sept. 4, in its article on "Little Siberia," makes a pardonable mistranslation of Bergfrauen as "mountain women," since the German language can at times be untranslatable. The word Berg, although it means mountain when it stands alone, means mine when it precedes another noun; e.g., Bergwerk-mine, Bergakademie-mining institute, Bergmann-miner. Bergmann, it is true, can mean mountaineer, but only when we are speaking of mountains. In this instance, the term Bergfrauen refers to women who mine...
Having been surreptitiously in the Eastern German city of Aue, the "head of the mountains" in the Erz Gebirge which is a headquarters of the Soviet pitchblende mining enterprise, I should like to report an additional service . . . performed by these Bergfrauen. In the Russian army, as in the late Wehrmacht, commanding officers are authorized to provide bordellos for their commands . . . This aspect of uranium mining (it is actually published in leaflets, which seek to lure workers to the mines) does not seem to have the desired drawing power, however, so more direct methods for the procurement of labor are resorted...
Female workers, dubbed Bergfrauen (mountain women) by the local population, labor as hard as the men, digging, clearing trenches, building galleries, pushing trolleys. Average pay is 200-400 East marks ($8 to $16) weekly, although a worker who exceeds the "norm" may make more. Many miners, who are issued no dust-masks, suffer from the occupational disease of silicosis. Many others suffer from gas poisoning caused by the badly ventilated mines; doctors send them back to work if they are not more than "50% disabled." The accident rate is high. News of major mining disasters continues to seep out, despite...
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