Chimney Sweep Museum

The Chimney Sweep Museum is located in the park of Villa Antonia in Santa Maria Maggiore, a town in Val Vigezzo, Piedmont.

The building is divided into two floors: on the ground floor is a display of bicycles, tools, clothes and paintings that tell the story of the trade, while the upper floor offers an interactive itinerary with popular songs about chimney sweeps and panels reporting the testimonies of those who carried out this hard profession.

Towards the end of the 19th century and until 1940, the very poor economic conditions of the Val Vigezzo prompted many families to "lease" their children aged between six and twelve, to men, often unscrupulous, who in exchange for a piece of bread or a few pennies taught the trade to the little ones. Children were preferred because they were slender and could easily climb the narrow passages to be swept. These underaged chimney sweeps plied their trade in the large villas or palaces in Piedmontese and Lombard cities, but some also went abroad, as far as Holland.

The “rüsca”, as the young workers were called, were forced with threats and beatings to lower themselves into the narrow chimney flues, inhaling soot all day long, suffering from the cold and sometimes risking their lives to put out a fire or suffering injuries. The chimney sweeps moved by bicycle and carried the tools of their trade: the rasp, the brischetin (the toilet brush), the so-called hedgehog, iron blades arranged in a radial pattern to clean the flues, the squareta (the barrel on whose top the hedgehog was placed), the caparüza, i.e. the bag to put on the head when climbing into the fireplace to protect it from the soot and finally the sach, the bag that was used both to collect the soot to be sold as fertilizer and to shelter from the rain or snow as well as a blanket to warm up.

Usually, a chimney sweep cleaned between 15 and 20 chimneys a day, strenuously crawling on their elbows and knees, which were often soaked in their own blood. At the end of the working day, the boys returned to their bed and were subjected to the ridicule of their older companions; usually their masters also introduced them to alcohol, gambling and the underworld. Many of them, however, thanks to the sound principles they learned during their first years of life spent at home, with commitment and determination managed to lead a dignified life.