On the East German side of the border, Uranium mining started essentially as gulag-style worker camps under Soviet control right after the war, and a few years later was moved into the "Wismut AG", which was a company under shared East German / Soviet ownership. From the tales of my grandparents, it was a mix of Soviet oppression and Wild West. In the Wismut, the miners were very well paid (for post-war East Germany), but they were a rowdy bunch and quite often had quarrels (also physical) with the East German police and Soviet camp guards (who of course couldn't simply "mow down" their highly qualified work force). Eventually in the mid- to late 50's, it calmed down, and working for the Wismut was more or less a normal job (albeit with a high risk of dying early of lung cancer and/or silicosis).

After the reuninification, the German government invested big into fixing the environmental damage that was done in 40 years, and that took over a decade. Props to them for this, the Erzgebirge is quite a nature paradise today.