CLERMONT-FERRAND lies at the northern tip of the Massif Central. Although its situation is magnificent, almost encircled by the wooded and grassy volcanoes of the Monts-Dômes
, it has for a century been a typical smokestack industrial centre, the
home base of Michelin tyres, which makes it a rather incongruous
capital for the rustic, even backward province of the Auvergne.
Its
roots, both as a spa and a communications and trading centre, go back
to Roman times. It was just outside the town, on the plateau of
Gergovia to the south, that the Gauls under the leadership of
Vercingétorix won their only, albeit indecisive, victory against Julius
Cæsar's invading Romans. In the Middle Ages, the two towns of Clermont
and Montferrand were pided by commercial and political rivalry and
ruled respectively by a bishop and the count of Auvergne.
Louis XIII united them administratively in 1630, but it was not until
the rapid industrial expansion of the late nineteenth century that the
two really became indistinguishable. Indeed, it was Clermont that took
the ascendancy, relegating Montferrand to a suburban backwater.
Michelin
came into being thanks to the inventions of Charles Mackintosh, the
Scotsman of raincoat fame. His niece married Édouard Daubrée, a
Clermont sugar manufacturer, and brought with her some ideas about
making rubber goods that she had learnt from her uncle. In 1889, the
company became Michelin and Co, just in time to catch the development
of the automobile and the World War I aircraft industry. The family
ruled the town and employed 30,000 of its citizens until the early
1980s, when the industry went into decline. In the years since, the
workforce has been halved, causing rippling unemployment throughout
Clermont's economy. Many of those who have lost their jobs are
Portuguese immigrants, imported over the last thirty years to fill the
labour vacuum and well integrated with the local population.
As in many other
traditional industrial towns hit by recession and changing global
patterns of trade, Clermont has had to struggle to reorientate itself,
turning to service industries and the creation of a university of
34,000 students. Nonetheless, many people have moved elsewhere in
search of work, reducing the population by nearly a tenth. The town has
changed physically, too, as many of the old factories have been
demolished.
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