Twist is a municipality in the Emsland district, in Lower Saxony, Germany. It is situated directly on the Dutch border. Situation of the local parts in the municipality of Twist: More than half of the population lives in the center of the municipality (i.e. Twist-Siedlung and Bült). The other half is spread over the other villages, of which Schöningsdorf (population about 1100) and Rühlerfeld (900) are the largest. The other villages are smaller (Adorf about 500, Hebelermeer 400, Neuringe 300 inhabitants). History The settlement in the area of today's municipality Twist began quite late around the year 1784. The prince-bishop of Münster Max Franz satisfied the wishes of some "Heuerleute", a kind of farmer, from the nearby village of Hesepe to settle down in the bog "Twist". This was the starting point of the settlement in Twist; to be more precise it starts at the street of houses which is nowadays called "Alt-Hesepertwist". The ground was at that time quite infertile because of its composition and did just allow a meager livelihood and so the people did not live in any comfort. The construction of the canal "Nord-Süd-Kanal" about 100 years later brought significant improvements in the quality of life of the people, because the canal allowed a systematic drainage and removal of the peat. In the 1950s the economic revival finally arrived on the one hand by finding larger oil deposits and on the other hand by commissioning of the production site of the Dutch plastics company Wavin. These two factors were over some decades the driving forces for the economical rise of Twist. In 1986 Twist celebrated its 200th anniversary. The anniversary festivities ended with a pageant which had respect to the history and current circumstances in Twist. For instance one of the numerous parade floats showed a detailed replica of the church St. Georg (biggest church in Twist). In the 1990s the two main columns of Twist's economy, oil production and the plastic production declined more and more; and economic hard times meant many people lost their jobs. With the finishing of the autobahn 31 at the end of the 1990s this negative development was stopped by siting new companies especially in the industrial area close to the autobahn. In August/September 2011 Twist celebrated its 225th anniversary. The 10-day-long festival started with a "Twist-Schau" (Twist Show). This show was performed like a play in Low German language