Near Düsseldorf, in the romantic Neandertal Valley where the Düssel flows through the gentle slopes, Italian quarry workers dug up 16 bone fragments and a skull in 1856. Scientists from Bonn complemented these findings with additional anatomical excavations of homo neanderthalensis. The Neanderthals made the meadow landscape world-famous. However, in the past the idyllic scenery was disturbed by an industrial wasteland in the valley with a crumbling old paper mill in the centre.