Giuseppe Eberle and Luigia Zanrosso arrived in Brazil in 1884, in one of the first batches of Italian immigrants, and settled in the Italian colony of Caxias do Sul. Their four children came with them, including four-year-old Abramo, the second oldest. In Brazil, six more children would be born. Giuseppe Eberle had prepared for immigration. Before traveling, he bought some
alembics and boilers, anticipating that, in the colony, such equipment would be a valuable rarity; he also brought hats and fruit tree seedlings, as well as funds from the sale of his farm in Magré. Once he arrived, he acquired a rural lot and, one year later, a small metalwork shop owned by
Francisco Rossi, on Sinimbu Street, where he also set up a business. On his rural lot he planted an orchard and manufactured
grappa, while his wife, known as Gigia Bandera, managed the business in town. On weekends, Giuseppe worked in the city as a barber, a job he had in Italy. By 1892, the family also owned two other pieces of land, operated by contract farmers. Young Abramo, who was 12 at the time, supervised one of the properties and helped with the family's other investments. Due to the heavy workload, Abramo had a poor early education. In the same year he married Elisa Venzon, a member of a high society family and owner of a windmill and a sawmill, with whom he had José Abramo (Beppin, December 16, 1901), Angelina (04/01/1904), Rosália (January 31, 1906), Julio João (November 21, 1907), Adélia (June 30, 1910), who was the first queen of the
Grape Festival, and Zaíra and Lília (April/1919). His wife would soon prove to be a skilled business administrator, allowing Abramo to travel frequently in search of new markets, suppliers and business partners and to establish himself as an important exporter. Pedro Eberle, his brother, was also a valuable helper who later became a partner in the business. and being a member of the Directory of the
Liberal Republican Party. He received the rank of colonel in the
National Guard and aligned himself with the
fascist ideology, which in the 1920s–1930s had great penetration in the colonial region and played an important role in the formation of the collective identity of Italians, based on concepts of progress, discipline, work, and hierarchy. With the outbreak of
World War II in 1939, which made imports from Europe difficult, Abramo, in a pioneering venture, began to manufacture electric motors to meet the country's needs, conquering an important market and making a significant leap in its sales, which doubled compared to the pre-war period. At the same time, the metallurgical company was requested by the
Federal Government to "serve the Homeland" in the war effort, producing swords, rapiers, and sabers for the
Brazilian Expeditionary Force. his company was seen as a model and stood out in Brazil, and received frequent visits from personalities of state and national projection, and even from foreigners such as the
ambassadors of the United States and Canada, being invariably praised with enthusiasm. The military attaché at the British Embassy in Brazil, Colonel William Frederick Rohdes, reported: "The Englishman is usually a man of few words. But having visited the Metalúrgica Abramo Eberle mills I am willing to write a whole book about the fantastic force that the factory is making for Brazil". and the statues of the
National Monument to the Immigrant, cast in
bronze from the model by sculptor
Antônio Caringi. Abramo would return to the United States and Europe many times to study modern production processes and implement them in his business. He was at the head of his industry for almost 50 years, until his death at age 65 on January 13, 1945, which caused a commotion in the city, leading a crowd to his burial. On the top of the company's headquarters building, in downtown Caxias do Sul, a small wooden house, a replica of Abramo's first metalwork shop, shows how much the immigrant's dream has grown. Abramo was favored by flourishing in a period of accelerated growth in Caxias do Sul, but while many other entrepreneurs in the city had meteoric careers that took them very high but went bankrupt in a matter of a decade or two, much of his continued success was due to his great adaptability to an economic and social context that varied greatly over the years, adopting production methods that were constantly being updated and frequently varying the product line according to the needs of the markets. The power of his company played a central role in the industrialization of the state's highland region, stimulating markets and partnerships and mobilizing a large workforce, which was a decisive impulse for the formation of the
metalworking pole in the city, one of the largest in Brazil today. In Tessari's words, The growth of Abramo Eberle's company is massive as it completes fifty years of existence. Abramo Eberle's role was fundamental for this achieved success: the result of his entrepreneurship and the paternal relationship he had with his employees. Furthermore, it is important to note the construction of a myth that served to reinforce the authority of the local businessmen: the idea of material and moral wealth conquered through hard but dignified human labor. On the pediment of the mill owned by the immigrant
Aristides Germani (established in Caxias at the end of the 19th century), for example, a high relief announced:
LABOR OMNIA VINCIT (work conquers all). On the facade of Abramo Eberle's new Metallurgical building, built in the first half of the 1940s, there was something similar: HONORABLE AND CONSTANT WORK WINS EVERYTHING. In the popular language, transmitted orally between generations of immigrants, the
talian dialect proverbs, brought from Italy and developed in Brazil, also show the importance of work for that society, identifying its results, often miraculous:
El sudore no lé mia santo, ma ndove el casca el fá mirácoli (Sweat is not holy, but where it falls it works miracles).In Caxias do Sul, his name was given to a school and a square, where a monument was erected in his memory. He also named an alley in Porto Alegre, streets in
Concórdia and
Gravataí, the chair of Political Economy at
PUCRS in Porto Alegre, and an Industrial Gymnasium in
Osório. In an opinion poll conducted in 1999 among 100 community leaders from different areas by students from the Journalism Course at the
University of Caxias do Sul, he was elected one of the 30 Personalities of Caxias do Sul – Highlights of the 20th Century. The
historic buildings of her metallurgical plant and the
palace where she lived were declared a heritage site. Her mother, remembered as a symbol of female entrepreneurship, was also honored, with the institution of the Gigia Bandera Trophy by the Union of Metallurgical, Mechanical and Electrical Material Industries of Caxias do Sul, a distinction that recognizes metallurgical merit. == See also ==