The Ruhr area, also called Ruhrpott (Pott for short), is known throughout Germany for its openness, for its cordiality and for its solidarity. This developed historically, because the "underground drudgery" required mutual trust. Every day, millions of men risked their lives and their health to bring the black gold to the surface. Weather man, pit foreman, squire, tusker, cart runner: all the miners were covered with a black layer of dust at work, the dirt started in the washing machine and shirts were only neat and clean on Sundays. A colliery brings generations together – sons, fathers and grandfathers usually worked at the same colliery: "Born on coal", they still say in the Pott today. Because the fathers are still around and pass on their memories to their sons and grandchildren.