Industries

In the preceding pages we gave an overview of industrial activity in this archipelago in its principal aspects. In this article we give a brief account of other industries which, although of lesser importance, deserve a place here for the information of some of the readers of this work.

At present (1921) Madeira has 2 fish canneries, 1 tobacco factory (see that entry), 1 stearin candle factory, 2 wax candle factories, 1 brewery, 2 soft-drink factories, 2 soap factories (see Soap works), 2 nail factories, 1 factory of cement roof tiles and floor tiles, 6 sawmills, 5 factories of biscuits and crackers, 7 pasta factories, 1 chemical fertiliser factory and 1 paint factory. There are also a foundry, several small butter factories (see that entry), 7 cheese factories, 5 potteries, 6 mills and about 300 watermills for grinding cereals, and various cabinet-making workshops, some of which make very elegant furniture that rivals what comes from Portugal. There are small tanneries and a great number of wine presses where the grapes that yield the island’s delicious wines are pressed (see Wines), estufas (heated store for ageing Madeira wine) (see that entry) for treating those same wines, 2 workshops for minor ship repairs and shipbuilding, various fireworks workshops, several lime kilns, many looms, etc., etc. Embroiderers (see Embroidery) are spread throughout the island, and there are also makers of botas chãs (traditional flat-soled leather boots), or potato-skin boots, of rye-straw hats and of wickerwork (see Camacha, Broom and Osier), as well as people engaged in dyeing, although this industry is still very backward here. Special mention is also due to the industry of wood inlay which, though little developed, has a characteristic regional character and is much appreciated by foreigners (see Inlaid work).

The industries of stearin candles, nails, cheese, chemical fertilisers, paints, cement tiles, biscuits and crackers, and tuna canning are modern on the island. Tuna canning is carried on at the Ponta da Cruz (‘point of the cross’) factory, founded in 1909, and at the Paul do Mar (‘marsh by the sea’) factory, founded in 1912. All the remaining industries are more or less old, some dating back to the 15th and 16th centuries, such as sugar, milling, soap, sawmilling, broom wares, etc., etc.

The Ponta da Cruz cannery exported 557,085 kilos of tuna to Portugal in 1910, the year in which it prepared the largest quantity of fish. The stearin candle factory referred to above came to supply more than 60,000 packets a year, but it has now reduced its production for reasons unknown to us.

Many tallow candles were once made in Funchal, but this industry began to disappear around 1878, when stearin candles from England, sold at very modest prices, flooded our market. In earlier times tallow candles were found in the homes of rich and poor alike, and were sold at 20 réis (old Portuguese money of account; 1$000 = 1,000 réis, 1:000$000 = one conto = 1,000,000 réis) each.

Before the war, the mills and watermills of Madeira and the windmills of Porto Santo ground 9 to 10 million kilograms of wheat, of which 7 to 8 million were imported; 11 to 12 million kilograms of maize, almost all of it imported; and about 350 thousand kilograms of barley and rye, grown on the island. In the time of the donataries only they could own cereal mills and public ovens, although anyone was permitted to have a hand mill, provided he did not grind for others.

The sawing of timber is, like milling, a fairly old industry. Frutuoso refers to it, as does the letter of grant (carta de doação) of the captaincy of Funchal made by Prince Henry the Navigator to João Gonçalves Zarco. According to that chronicler, ‘on the island there was so great a quantity of timber, so fine and hard, that an abundance of boards, beams and masts was carried to many parts, all of which was sawn with engines or water-powered saws, of which there are still many today on the north side of the same island.’ On this subject it is worth reading the pamphlet Serras de Agua na Ilha da Madeira e Porto Santo (‘Water Saws on the Island of Madeira and Porto Santo’), published in 1937 by Dr Jordão de Freitas.

Instead of the water-powered saws, there are now several sawmills driven by steam power, six of them the principal ones, as stated above.

Frutuoso mentions the soap and wickerwork industries. The former was a monopoly until the publication of the law of 25 April 1857. By 1860 there were already two soap factories, and two exist at present too, although large quantities of soap are nevertheless imported from Portugal for consumption on the island.

In 1856 there was a brewery in Funchal, and metal founding perhaps dates from 1834. Eighty years ago iron, tin, copper and zinc were already being cast in the workshops of José Pires Soares and William Hinton, using blast furnaces, with the bellows worked by hand or by horses. If this industry did not grow at once here, it was because large quantities of metal goods of various kinds came from England and were sold here at low prices. Besides the foundry now (1921) established in Rua 5 de Junho, there was until a few years ago another in the former Rua da Princesa.

Although rye-straw plaiting for hat-making is carried out in Funchal and Camacha, it is in Estreito de Câmara de Lobos (‘the narrows of Câmara de Lobos’) that this industry is most developed and the finest work is done. The weavers of this last parish (freguesia) also plait the straw from which openwork hats for ladies are made.

Cheese-making, stagnant for years but now apparently making progress, is carried on in Faial, Estreito de Câmara de Lobos, Ponta do Sol and Canhas. Adolfo Burnay made the first cheeses in Madeira, in a dairy he set up in Santo da Serra (‘the saint of the uplands’) in 1895. That attempt was unsuccessful, however, and only fifteen years later did some cheeses begin to appear in the municipality (concelho) of Ponta do Sol which, thanks to their pleasant flavour and good preparation, won public favour.

Looms are widespread across the island, weaving linen, tow cloth and mixed fabrics of linen and wool (seriguilha (homespun linen-and-wool cloth), marafuz (coarse homespun linen-and-wool cloth), etc.). According to a set of statistics before us, about eighty years ago the whole district produced 143,000 metres of linen, 3,300 of tow cloth and 7,800 of mixed fabrics. Today, however, this output has fallen perhaps by half, because homespun cloth is less in demand for household use. The municipalities of Calheta, Sant’Ana and Ponta do Sol produce the greatest quantity of linen and linen-and-wool fabrics.

Not only the sailing and rowing boats that serve the waters of the archipelago are built in Madeira, but also the small steamer Vitoria, which used to sail along the south coast of Madeira. This steamer was built in Machico. More than fifty years ago, to the east of the former Praça Académica (‘academic square’), Madeiran workmen built the small but excellent steamer Queen, which, after sailing in our waters, went on to serve on the Tagus. In 1920 the yacht Gonçalves Zargo was built in the Cabrestante (‘capstan’) enclosure, and another vessel of greater tonnage than that one – the yacht Anfitrite, likewise intended for voyages on the high seas – is now (1921) under construction in the Campo do Almirante Reis (‘Admiral Reis field’).

There are three potteries in Funchal, the most important of which is the Funchalense, on the Estrada do Conde de Carvalhal. It is expected that a first-class establishment for the manufacture of glass (see Trachytes) and of roof tiles, bricks, etc. will shortly be set up in the locality (sítio) of Gorgulho (1921). The raw materials used in the island’s ceramics are red clay, white sand and saltpetre from Portugal, and massapez (heavy ferruginous clay soil) clay from Madeira and Porto Santo (‘holy harbour’); the latter, however, has the drawback of sometimes cracking when not combined with another clay, owing to an excess of ferric oxide. At Estreito da Calheta (‘the narrows of Calheta’) curved roof tiles, jugs and other objects are made using only the local clay.

Frutuoso says that on Porto Santo there were many dragon trees, from whose trunks a great deal of ware was made. Today, however, these trees are extinct on that island, and in Madeira, where they are very rare, they are not used for anything at all. Spoons and other objects are made from the wood of heath and folhado (Clethra arborea, a native tree) in Camacha and other parishes.

In the countryside of Madeira, and especially in Porto Moniz (‘Moniz’s harbour’), pasta is made by means of very rudimentary machines built on the island. Establishments equipped with improved machinery for the same purpose exist only in Funchal and Santa Cruz (‘Holy Cross’).

The confectionery industry was of some importance in Funchal, as we saw on p. 298 of volume I of this Elucidario. Among Madeira’s small cottage industries, mention should be made of feather and paper flowers, birdcages, palm-leaf hats (see Caniço) and ginger beer. The women of Madeira, says Frutuoso, ‘besides being very well favoured, very beautiful, discreet and virtuous, are outstanding in the perfection of rich and exquisite dishes of every kind, and in all the inventions of rich things they make, not only on cloth with polished needlework, but also in sugar with delicate fruits.’

At the end of 1912 there were 494 registered industrial establishments in the whole district, and the industrial workforce numbered 3,547 persons: 209 employees, 287 masters and foremen, and 3,051 workers. The last class comprised 2,042 men, 426 women, 288 boys and 295 girls.

Although Madeira is a more agricultural than industrial country, there are nonetheless industries that may be considered vigorous here, and others that hold out promise and are already more or less profitable today. The workforce is as a rule active and intelligent, and if it does not always produce work free of certain defects, this is because its limited education, not only literary but also artistic, does not allow it to advance as it should.

The industry processing the products of sugar cane is among the most valuable on the island; also very important are embroidery, butter, milling, soap, foundry work and beer. These last two industries, which were carried on by Portuguese, are now in the hands of foreigners, and it was likewise an English industrialist who for many years held the monopoly of sugar manufacture throughout the district.