Midlum Brickyard

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Whether brick churches, stone houses or typical small farm houses with an integrated barn at the backpart of the house (Gulfhaus): they are all made of the same material - clinker brick in the typical Ostfriesland red. The Ems Area is the cradle of these particular bricks. And the brickfactory in Midlum was one of dozens in the Rheiderland, that provided people with bread and wages. During the primetime of thise facrories, the chimneys smoked of 26 brickfactories along the river and 164 brickmakers at work.

Today only the former brick factory Cramer in Midlum remains. It was founded in 1799 by Willem Wollten Heykes. The direct access to the Ems river as a transport route and the dyke foreland, which provided the raw material for the bricks, made the location ideal for the brick factories. In the neighbourhood stood the brickfactory Leding, of which only a chimney remains today. A special feature of the Cramer clinker brick factory is the imposing ring kiln, built in 1891. 160,000 bricks could be fired in one go. Between Bingum and Ditzum, there were twelve ring kilns that produced up to 40 million bricks a year. The oil crisis brought the end of the Cramer brickworks. It had to be closed in 1972. After that, the building lay dormant for many years until it was reopened in 1998. As part of a German-Dutch employment project for young people and was cleared out, spruced up and brought back up to scratch. Since then the Jemgum Brickworks Association has been looking after the old clinker factory. The brick factory museum can be visited by appointment. Events are held several times a year. Currently a biosphere house is planned under the roof of the clinker brick factory, where the variety and interrelationships of the environment, nature and climate will be showcased and harmoniously brought together.