Cseh Valentin szerk.: „70 éve alakult a MAORT” – tanulmányok egy bányavállalat történetéből (2009)

Zsuzsa Kovács: The Oil Age and Its Impact on Everyday Village Life In Zala County's Settlements

Gellénháza Executive Committee to instigate measures that would promote the creation of collective farming, as well as to start education work among residents so as to make them understand the importance of this issue. The members of the EC, however, back-pedalled by arguing that large scale farming - which was the most correct form of tilling the land of course - was nonetheless impossible to implement in the village, because the oil company had already ripped large areas from lands suitable for cultivation, and their occupation of these was still in progress.

261 The second wave of collectivisation in 1960 nevertheless did not pass Gellénháza either, and the Collective was established even there, taking the name Green Meadow Farming Collective ('Zöldmező Termelőszövetkezet'). During the 1950s, relations between the village and the oil people were not only poisoned bv the expropriation of lands, but also the preferential status of oil workers in the village. The settlement's new centre was previously constructed on ground belonging to the village outskirts, where several semi-detached houses with all conveniences, six two-storey worker's hostels that counted as very modern at the time, and additional services buildings were pulled up. The new flats had running water, natural gas heating, and bathrooms, plus every house was hooked up to the settlement's sewage system. The life of those who lived on the street christened Oil miner Boulevard was therefore initially much more comfortable than that of village residents,

26S who made the biggest grievance of the lack of electrification. Thev argued that while the connection of electricity to one half of the village was managed, so the benefits of electric lighting could be enjoyed in one part of the settlement, especially by industrial workers residing at the housing development, the other part of the village - a segregated sector, as it were - was not able to share in this.

266 These circumstances led to divisions between the villagers and the development's inhabitants. Although such tensions became a lot more moderate as the decades passed, but the antagonism can still be felt today. The stereotypes of "development people-villagers" evolved in the 60s, and events in the settlement were interpreted along the lines of this framework. One may find several references concerning the necessity to resolve the conditions that came about in the EC minutes of meeting, and in addition to the official routes, it was the informal solutions that proved most effective. As evidenced by the documents, the averseness of the older generation could not be detected among younger people, as a kind of fellowship developed among them at the community centre's events. Indeed, thev unwillingly became the vehicle for ameliorating the antagonism among their parents.

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1 The boom decades In the beginning, besides the jobs and the certain pay they provided, Gellénháza's residents felt the burdens that the company forced on the settlement. This tension started to decrease from the second half of the 50s, when visible signs of a boom started to appear in addition to the difficulties. In the old days, just a single mixed supplies store served to supply goods in thevillage, whereas in 1959 there were already two grocery stores, a hardware store, a butcher's shop, a textile store, two saloons, and a coffee shop to provide for the needs of the inhabitants. 264 ZML Gellénháza Village Council Executive Committee minutes of meeting, [une 13, 1955. FF.NYVF.SI 1987. 264 ZML Gellénháza Village Council Executive Committee minutes of meeting, [anuary 15, 1955. :

'' ZML Gellénháza Village Council Executive Committee minutes of meeting, April 17, 1967.