Roombeek

Enschede is an industrial city in the east of the Netherlands with about 150,000 inhabitants. The area in which the fireworks depot was situated is called Roombeek, about a kilometer north of the city centre.

A strong characteristic of Roombeek was the fact that houses and industrial buildings stood side-by-side. This dates back to the time that Enschede was the country's main textile industry centre, in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. When a number of textile companies chose it as their base, it caused the city to grow dramatically. Factories that were built at the edge of the city, were soon surrounded by houses needed for the workers to live in. This pattern can still be found throughout the city, although the prime of the textile industry ended long ago.

This map from around 1902 shows that the area now called Roombeek was outside the city. It also shows how industrialization was taking over the area.

Click here to return to the original map.