Rödermark

Rödermark is a city in the Offenbach Rural District in the state of Hesse, Germany.
Geography.
Rödermark is in the "Rhine Main area" southeast of Frankfurt. The whole area of the town is large and it is above sea level. It is a plain area with nearly no hills.
About 20 to 35 million years ago in the age of tertiary, the whole region was lying under sea level. At that time it was covered by an ocean which was warm and not very deep. Lots of sediments sank to its bottom. Then the region rose again and the water left, leaving soil which is mostly sandy and poor.
The town consists out of the 2 former independent villages "Ober-Roden" and "Urberach". On 1 January 1977 they were united and became the "municipality of Rödermark". On 23 August 1980 the town privileges were given to the municipality.
The city has 5 urban districts. These are "Ober-Roden", "Urberach", "Waldacker", "Messenhausen" and "Buhlau".
The ending "-roden" is a hint to the former landscape. The German verb "roden" means "cutting down trees to cultivate land".
The neighbours of Rödermark are: 
Rödermark has 27,858 inhabitants (2008). 10.7% of the people living here are from foreign countries.
The climate of the town is mild. There is less rain than in other parts of Germany.
Some local people are speaking a regional type (dialect) of the German language with a certain tone and special words. It is a Hessian dialect (German: "Hessisch"). This language type is related to other dialects in the south of Germany. In former times mostly every village had its own special dialect, sometimes hard to understand for people of other parts of Germany. Today the dialect speakers are a minority and mostly it is no longer the dialect they speak but a kind of regular German with a certain pronunciation.
History.
The first settlements were build in the 8th century. At that time their names were written down in documents.
Formerly the people in the Rödermark area were farmers and craftsmen but not tradesmen. Every family had land to grow their food. When the property was handed to the next generation it was divided within the children. Therefore most families had only small farms and were poor. With the industrial revolution the Rhine Main area got lots of factories and developed to a center for metal working and leather manufacturing, also chemical processing. Many men got workmen and found a job in the factories and earned money. This increased living conditions partly.