China's water history

BWTAS recently received enquiries about images of Shanghai's metal water tower that we have covered in this journal and so were informed that a second steel water tower was built in Shanghai around 1905 by John Taylor and Sons. A drawing of it can be found in Chelsea to Cairo: Taylor-made water through eleven reigns and in six continents - Thomas Telford, London, a history of the engineering firm by Gwilym Roberts.


Dr Albert Koenig of Hong Kong University and co-author Du Pengfei of Tsinghua University would like to enlist the help of BWTAS members and water tower enthusiasts around the world as they are preparing a chapter on the water history of pre-modern China for a book: The Evolution of Water Supply Throughout the Millennia to be published by International Water Association Publishing. This tome is undoubtedly going to be on a lot of this journal's readers' wish lists. 


The authors know another tower, an Eiffel-type hexagonal plan metal construction, was built for the Capital Water Ltd. in Beijing. Unfortunately, they cannot discover anything about its designer or builder. 

Source: Gong shui zhi in: Beijing zhi. Shi zheng juan. Gong shui zhi. Gong re zhi. Ran qi zhi, (2003) Beijing Shi di fang zhi bian zuan wei yuan hui, ed. Beijing chu ban she, Beijing, p. 168ff.

Beijing water tower under construction, Photo taken by Ernst Boerschmann c.1907.

Source: Robert K.G. Temple (1990) Im Land des fliegenden Drachen: Chinesische Erfindungen aus vier Jahrtausenden. Vorwort von Joseph Needham. Gustav Luebbe Verlag, Bergisch Gladbach, Germany. 

This type of tower, with its six legs, seems to sit somewhere somewhere on the road to development of the circular hyperboloid structure. 


It was photographed under construction by the noted sinologist Ernst Boerschmann in 1907, who is well worth looking into as a subject. Between 1902 and 1949 he produced thousands of stunning photographs of China's old and modern architecture and its people.


If you know of any tower of a similar construction, please contact the authors at the email address below* and, if possible, provide the name of the designer.


kalbert (at) hkucc.hku.hk 


(*if you're not a spam bot, you'll know what to do)

Save the Sudbury water towers campaign

Mind we are talking Greater Sudbury, Ontario.

When plans were afoot to demolish two iconic water towers known as 'Pearl Street' and 'Pine Street' respectively in Canada's Nickel City, a group of local artists put up an impressive resistance; not by sit-ins and petitions but by mounting exhibitions illustrating the towers' value as cultural objects far beyond their municipal purpose.

Built in 1956, the two towers stayed in use until 1998 when they were decommissioned. Standing tall on sites overlooking the city, the towers turn an otherwise unremarkable cityscape into an interesting panorama.

The present outcome appears to be that the city has voted to remove Pine Street but in 2010 a developer bought Pearl Street and plans to convert it, meantime exploiting its landmark value by erecting 'art boards' (plain speaking: billboards) to raise the revenue to fund this. Many ideas are floating around for turning it into a heritage centre, an art gallery or viewing platform or all three. A feasibility study has been undertaken of various proposals citing the successful redevelopment of other surplus water towers.

This was all started in 2009 by Joel Kimmel, an illustrator originally from Ottawa who became fascinated with water towers on a trip to New York in 2005. He loved them so much that he moved to Brooklyn and roamed the streets beneath the towers for two years. In 2009 he moved to Sudbury where he immediately chose the water towers as his favorite landmarks.

Joel and his chums got 50 other artists and photographers in Sudbury and lovers of water towers from around the world to submit their artwork to be displayed on their website and in an exhibition held in 2010 that raised awareness and showed the City of Greater Sudbury that the people love their towers. Take a look at the blog for some great pictures, then and now.

Whilst the blog hasn't had many updates recently (gosh, we can empathise with that), the very active Facebook group has over 600 members.

Water tower facts:

Pearl Street:
Built by Horton Steel Works Limited, Fort Eriein.
Volume 1,000,000 imperial gallons (3.8million liters- about 17000 bathtubs!)
Height to Underside of Bowl – 76 feet (about 23 meters)
Overall Height - 112 feet (about 34 meters- ? This may be wrong)
Diameter of Bowl – 96 feet (about 29 meters)
Height of Bowl – 36 feet (about 11 meters)
Centre Cylinder – 8 feet diameter
Tower Legs – 4 ft 4 in diameter at 75 ft spacing
330 Tonnes of Steel

Pine Street:

Volume 500,000 imperial gallons (1.9million liters- about 8,400 bathtubs!)
Overall Height- 131ft (about 40 meters)

Delta Force

It may be only 50,000 gallons and made of rusted metal but it has an unusual double tank design. The 1904 Rio Vista water tower on the California Delta (near Sacremento, USA) is a such a well known landmark to river traffic that it has just been dimantled to become the centrepiece of a new development.

The SF Chronicle reports "city leaders hope a new 'Discover the Delta' center will draw visitors, jolt the local economy and brand the delta as a unique California destination on par with the redwoods, mountains and coast.

The nonprofit center will include a model of the delta, a wine tasting room, farmers' market, classrooms and a museum showcasing the agricultural and cultural history of the region. Organizers hope to break ground on the $5 million project this summer and open to the public by next year."

People from the Rio Vista community turned out in their hundreds to see the workers dismantle them 135 foot tower which will be restored before being moved to its new home across the river. The event was also opportunity for local schools and community groups to get involved creating exhibits celebrating the tower's iconic status.

Officially called the Dutra tower these days, the tower had previously been owned by the Rio Vista Canning and Packing Company, Del Monte (known in the UK for tinned fruit cocktail) and then Blackwelder Manufacturing. The agricultural purpose of the tower explains its double tank design; the lower tank was for drinking water, the upper tank powered a flume that transported asparagus for processing and packing. Ninety percent of the world's canned asparagus, mostly white asparagus, was packed here. In the mid-sixties, the tower began to show its age and sprang leaks and was taken out of service.

The Dutra company donated the tower to the project. We couldn't agree more with their choice for an eye-catching iconic landmark than a water tower.

Read the story from the San Francisco Chronicle

Read about the tower and the project with slideshow

Simon's Town mystery tanks

David Erickson lives in Simon’s Town, the former British Naval Port on the Cape Peninsula in South Africa.

He has written to BWTAS looking for information about some local water tanks (we'll overlook that these aren't actually water towers as they are quite relevant, Ed.):

"There is a huge amount of fascinating infrastructure here, much of it dating back to Victorian times and earlier. As a Committee Member of the Simon’s Town Historical Society I have a number of research projects on the go. One of these concerns two octagonal water tanks, which may be early versions of the Braithwaite design. However, these are not pressed steel; they are cast iron panels with no internal stiffening. The panels are held together by square headed bolts and nuts, with what appears to be hand cut threads, so I suspect that these tanks are quite old. The tanks lie on former Royal Naval properties where there is a history of Royal Engineers’ construction works. For this reason it is believed that they are undoubtedly British in origin, probably made to a standard design and shipped out in sections for assembly on site. There are only four of these tanks in existence in South Africa.

One of the tanks was, I believe, built to supply water to an officer’s barracks that was constructed in about 1815 (the tank could of course have been a much later addition).

The cast iron tank dimensions are 3.87 metres overall external width x 2.12 metres overall height. The operating water capacity has been calculated to be 24 tonnes (approximately 5,400 U.K. gallons).

The tank side construction consists of a total of 16 identical rectangular cast iron panels, each 158 centimetres long x 103.5 centimetres high. These panels have integral flanges on all four sides, the vertical flanges being angled such that an octagon is formed when the panels are bolted together. The side panels are arranged two high and sit on a cast iron base which is in turn supported on eight brickwork piers. The cast iron base is comprised of eight flanged cast iron panels which taper from 158 centimetres at the outer edge to 53 centimetres, and one octagonal flanged panel measuring 129 centimetres across extremities; this is located at the centre of the tank base. All flanges are 15 millimetres thick x 91.2 millimetres web. The tank has an open top which has a light corrugated iron roof mounted above on a timber frame. The panels are bolted together with ⅝” bolts 70 mm long, with square bolt heads 1¼” across flats.

Despite very careful inspection, we have been unable to find any trace of the manufacturer – all of the panels are completely plain with no foundry marks or other identification."

David is appealing to BWTAS if anyone has come come across anything like this? He would be most interested in any historical data. If you can help him in any way, please contact

David Erickson
6 Flagship Way
Simon's Town

7975
Republic of South Africa
Tel./Fax: +27-21-786-3384
Email: erickson_at_ilive.co.za

Another one bites the dust...

The historic Imperial Tobacco plant water tower in Greenville South Carolina USA has been pulled down after standing for 72 years. The tower had been destabilized by a fire that destroyed most of the empty complex on April 16, 2008.

After eight months of planning, project foreman Jimmy Davis of Biggs Brothers Construction spent several days choreographing the maneuver that toppled the tower.

More here:

Imperial Tobacco plant water tower pulled down - News Reflector.com

Seeking a Tribute to the Ordinary in a Water Tower

From the New York Times Hernando Mississippi (near Memphis TN) is seeking landmark status for its ordinary metal water tower. Given the slow decline in the use of these towers (see the East Hampton posting), this is not such a bad idea. The NYT article goes on to say many of the things that BWTAS points out are the benefits of water towers and why they are appreciated. You can read it there.

Gong forever

Melissa Pionzio, a journalist and blogger for the Hartford Courant in Conneticut USA, has reported the demolition of the Gong Bell water tower in swanky East Hampton CT. Local teenagers, doubtless driven by raging hormones, were often inspired to scale the tower to graffiti messages to the person of their desire. Resident Tracy Kemp added that the water tower lasted 25 years longer than Billy's declared love for her.

The loss of this tower was also recorded by a local photographer R J Phil who noted on his blog "I wonder how many people will even notice that it is gone? When you see something every day, it becomes a part of the landscape of the town; a symbol of the manufacturing history that once was...

At 1:30 today they held a "ribbon-cutting" to begin the demolition of the Gong Bell water tower. The Gong Bell Co. made toys with bells in them during the early and middle part of the 20th century, many of which are very collectible now. East Hampton was (and is) known as "Belltown, USA", due to the number of companies producing bells here beginning in the mid-1800's. The Bevin Bros. Mfg. Co. is the only one left in East Hampton (and the the US) now, still producing fine bells after over 150 years.I know that the tower is old and unsafe, I understand the liabilities involved - BUT - I would like to think that the ceremony is a send-off for the landmark, rather than a "good riddance" to something that once stood as a monument to manufacturing in East Hampton, and the US in general. Having grown up here and seeing the tower every day, I will miss it, for it is one more thing from East Hampton's past that has gone the way of the bulldozer. The tower has looked over our town for almost 80 years and has seen a great deal of history come and go - the last train through in 1964, the fire in 1973 that burned down the Gong Bell factory and the commercial expansion and residential development that changes forever the small towns these sentinels protected. Rest in peace. "

Over 30 bell foundries once existed in East Hampton. Gong Bell Manufacturing Company is credited with inventing the first toy telephone and the first foot bell ever used.

The tower had been maintained for fire safety after the factory had closed but the town council now believe "the tower is no longer necessary for fire suppression," said town council chair Melissa Engel in a speech at the demolition ceremony. "Because we now rely on modern day pumps."

It has to be asked, as it can be shown, what if these electric pumps fail? The widespread flooding in the UK in 2008 knocked out electricity substations that drove water pumping stations, causing complete havoc in fire prevention and public health. The beauty of water towers is that gravity never fails to deliver water to anywhere below where it is stored.