1983: Howe Street Gasometers
By AHNZ
One more post to end the AHNZ Gasometer Trilogy. The discovery I made that kicked it off… “Most of the quaint little colonial cottages and tiny dairies have disappeared, but the gasometers and their delicate strutting still make an arresting pattern against the sky.” Ref. Keth S. Clark (1983) who also associates the Howe Street […]
Read more..April 25, 2019
1943: Freeman’s Bay Gasometers
By AHNZ
Duel gasometers in Auckland’s Freeman’s Bay 1943 (image left.) It’s a low gas day, both repositories having dropped to their lowest/subterranean level. The location is just opposite the corner of Victoria Park at the end of Beaumont Street, now New World. I had to hunt down the twin-gasometers on the old map. They appear derelict […]
Read more..April 24, 2019
1960s: Gasometer’s Demise
By AHNZ
For most of New Zealand’s industrial history, especially before electricity, towns had their own on-site coal gasworks to produce the energy for lighting, cooking, and heating. Until the 1960s/70s the state of technology dictated on-site storage; Thus the ubiquitous gasometer. Reluctantly I accept ‘gasometer’ is an accurate title for a giant gas silo although it’s […]
Read more..April 22, 2019
1938: Heavy Snow for Greymouth
By AHNZ
Today in history, 29 July, 1938, heavy snow fell in Greymouth. A rare event. No snow had even been seen for the past 7 years. “For the first time for seven years snow fell in Greymouth to-day, when weather suggestive of a blizzard was experienced right down to the sea coast. Mild temperatures were experienced […]
Read more..July 29, 2022
1862: Auckland Gas Company
By AHNZ
Then and now, the Auckland Gas Company (est.1862) building on Beresford Street. I think I read that it was the last hold-out on upgrading to electricity in Auckland because they stubbornly clung to their own energy source: gas. Once upon a time down the road there was the gas storage tank said to be the […]
Read more..July 25, 2019
