The Museum at Thann

Most every city in Alsace has a historical museum of some sort. Thann was no exception. For 2 euro you could get out of the sun and wander through the old three-story structure that serves at its museum. Following are some selected items for you.

Historically, Thann has been a wine village. At one time, the most influential group in town was the wine guild, a group of select village men who looked after the business. The intro picture shows a wine guild plaque from 1618. The second name listed is a "Baltzer Weber". I doubt that he was a relative...even a distant one. The surname "Weber" seems to be as common in German speaking countries as "Smith" is in English. But it is fun to speculate.

Evidently, the wine guild kept a chronicle of each growing season and harvest. The plaque below is the record for the year 1763. The writing on it is German. The French translation told us that "1763 - Humid spring. Flooding. On the Feast of Corpus Christi, a man fell from the summit of the tower while walking across the roof. Wine was good." Somehow I suspect the fellow who fell from the tower was into the wine that day. (The town, like all in that time, had a protective wall around it. The tower - a look out post - remains today despite the disappearance of the town wall.)

On the second floor was a big exhibit of sewing machines. Why? I have no idea. But it was OK. The pictures below show the exhibit and then a close-up of a model called "the Alsatia" made in Mulhouse.Finally, no home in the Vosges would be complete without a wood-burning ceramic stove to heat it during the winters. The model below was certainly one of the more up-scale. If you go to the pottery-making village of Soufflenheim, you can still buy these stoves. Actually, not so much to buy as to arrange to have one built into your home.