Turtmann

Turtmann (French: Tourtemagne) is a former municipality in the district of Leuk in the canton of Valais in Switzerland.

[2] Until 2003 Turtmann had a military airfield which was used by Swiss Air Force Northrop F-5 of fighter squadron 13.

Turtmann had an area, as of 2011[update], of 6.8 square kilometers (2.6 sq mi).

The blazon of the municipal coat of arms is Gules, a Bend wavy Argent a Griffin passant coward Or holding in dexter a sword of the second in chief two Mullets of Six of the third in base Coupeaux Vert and fleur-de-lys of the third.

[3] Most of the population (as of 2000[update]) speaks German (923 or 93.0%) as their first language, Albanian is the second most common (36 or 3.6%) and Italian is the third (15 or 1.5%).

[3] The historical population is given in the following chart:[2][10] The entire village of Turtmann is designated as part of the Inventory of Swiss Heritage Sites.

[11] In the 2007 federal election the most popular party was the CVP which received 62.45% of the vote.

In the federal election, a total of 561 votes were cast, and the voter turnout was 77.6%.

[13] In the 2007 Swiss Council of States election a total of 558 votes were cast, of which 26 or about 4.7% were invalid.

[3] There were 447 residents of the municipality who were employed in some capacity, of which females made up 34.9% of the workforce.

In the tertiary sector; 42 or 33.6% were in wholesale or retail sales or the repair of motor vehicles, 22 or 17.6% were in the movement and storage of goods, 21 or 16.8% were in a hotel or restaurant, 3 or 2.4% were the insurance or financial industry, 12 or 9.6% were technical professionals or scientists, 5 or 4.0% were in education and 4 or 3.2% were in health care.

[3] From the 2000 census[update], 833 or 84.0% were Roman Catholic, while 24 or 2.4% belonged to the Swiss Reformed Church.

The education system in the Canton of Valais allows young children to attend one year of non-obligatory Kindergarten.

All the lower and upper secondary students from Turtmann attend their school in a neighboring municipality.

Aerial view (1955)