Hard#

Hard, Vorarlberg, market town in the district of Bregenz, alt. 398 m, pop. 10,747, area 17.43 km2, industrial and commercial town west of Bregenz, between the entry of the River Rhine and the Bregenzerach into Lake Constance. - Customs office, local health and social insurance branch office, provincial fish farm, sheltered workshop; school: hauswirtschaftliche Berufsschule (vocational school for home economics). About 500 companies, 4,465 employed persons (1991), approx. 63 % work in the manufacturing sector: textile (2 knitwear factories, worsted mills) and plastics industry (containers, bottles), cheese factory, crane construction, marble works, bicycle factory, foodstuff production, stainless steel industry (e.g. sinks), metal-working industry (metal fittings, tools, machines, metal products), lacquers factory; wide range of commercial businesses; some tourism (21,693 overnight stays). - First documented mention 1249, market town since 1905; parish church (neo-Romanesque structure 1876, tower 1721/1882, Baroque choir); town hall (1909); Mittelweiherburg manor house (around 1570), the only moated residence in Vorarlberg, 1957-1962 restored and adapted to house the museum of textile printing and of the manufacture of printing blocks.