Schlutup – one day of autumn

My trip around Germany took me to Shlutup, located north east of Lübeck. It is an old fishing village with 6,000 inhabitants. Schlutup is one the smallest district of the Hanseatic city of Lübeck. And it’s belonging to the German federal state of Schleswig-Holstein.

Until the German reunification in 1990, Schlutup was on the German border (DDR/BRD) that are crossing it. Schlutup was the northernmost border crossing to East Germany for the transit traffic to Scandinavia via Rostock and Rügen. Also, all traffic in the immediate reunification crossed the village.

In the 1860’s, fish smokers were operating on a small scale. With the industrialization, the fish processing became the most important industry of the area. In 1907 there were 24 farms in Schlutup; 1929 were already 40. In large-scale temporary workers came from a wide range from Mecklenburg for filleting nets to fish mainly herring. This situation ended with the development of the first fish-filleting machine by the machine factory Rudolf Baader in Lübeck in 1921. It replaced the work capacity of eight women. Machines from the 1950s completed the workload of up to 30 women. As for the preservation of fish the vinegar was needed, so in 1915 the company Kühne was founded in Schlutup. It was closed in the year of 2002. In addition, for marketing as a permanent preserve appropriate containers were needed tinplate. In the production of fish cans. Even today, with the established 1909 Company Hawesta present fish processing in Schlutup.

Schlutup fisherman


A quite and calm village

Near the St. Andrew church which was built in 1436, there was a small fish store selling fresh salmon and herring (Peter Steffen GMBH), the smell guided me inside the store and I couldn’t resist to buy some fresh fish. In front of it, there was the Willy Brandt school, a tiny school surrounded by trees that starts to lose their leaves. I followed the small path that went down until I saw a small boat, breaking the silence of the calm of a Monday morning. Probably coming back from fishing, the fish boat was entering the harbor of Schlutup. After shipping through the maze of the river. A small and quite place, foggy and humid. This harbor with small fish boat, was just waiting to tell many stories of the past…

Schlutup fresh salmon Schlutup fresh salmon[/caption]