Of great importance was the establishment in 1911 of the housing corporation "Ons Limburg," by Dr. H.A. Poels, "priest and chaplain of labor in Limburg. Poels was an ardent fighter for the Catholic cause. Good housing facilities, set up according to the garden village concept, were, according to Poels, the best means to combat the moral depravity and the threat of socialism. In this respect, the Catholic Church and the mine managements had a common interest. Ons Limburg was no ordinary housing association, but an umbrella organization under which dozens of housing associations were founded in Limburg. These used Ons Limburg's services in construction, administration and management of their housing complexes. As head of the Technical Bureau of Ons Limburg, the Amsterdam Catholic architect Jan Stuyt, an acquaintance of Poels, was hired in 1912. In combination with the building land company 'Tijdig', founded by Poels in 1912, which sought to acquire building land inexpensively, Ons Limburg gave a powerful impetus to the construction of mining colonies in Limburg. Dozens of mining colonies were built in the mining region between 1900 and 1936, with a total of about 11,500 miners' houses, just under a thousand officers' houses, plus a number of companion houses. This accounted for the housing of about 40% of mining personnel.