Braat, Java, c. 1926. Source: Memorial album presented to J.H. Lagers.
Labourers of the Machine Building Factory of Braat at Ngagel, a suburb of Surabaya (Java) upstream of the Kalimas River, receive their wages (c. 1926). At the wall cases full of identification badges are to be seen, necessary for computing the proper sum for every individual. The persons to the extreme right and left seem to hold covers in which the payments have been handed out.
Surabaya has a long tradition as an industrial city. The first steel plant was set up there in 1808. B. Braat Jzn. started his factory in 1901. In 1926 the firm employed in its three Java establishments together (offices and factories at Surabaya, Yogyakarta and Tegal) 74 Europeans (with salaries totaling DFL 360,000,- or DFL 4,865 per capita) and 1,200 Indonesians (with wages totaling DFL 445,000.- or DFL 371.25 per capita per year, which makes about DFL 1.20 per day).
Surabaya has a long tradition as an industrial city. The first steel plant was set up there in 1808. B. Braat Jzn. started his factory in 1901. In 1926 the firm employed in its three Java establishments together (offices and factories at Surabaya, Yogyakarta and Tegal) 74 Europeans (with salaries totaling DFL 360,000,- or DFL 4,865 per capita) and 1,200 Indonesians (with wages totaling DFL 445,000.- or DFL 371.25 per capita per year, which makes about DFL 1.20 per day).